Property tycoon builds stately home in Cotswolds

WHAT do you do with your spare time when you are the scion of one of Britain’s
wealthiest property dynasties, with a family fortune of £180m? If you are
Jamie Ritblat, you build a neo-classical mansion on your Cotswolds estate.

Ritblat, whose father is lifetime president of the FTSE 100 developer British
Land, is midway through building an 18th-century-style mansion at his farm
near Winchcombe, Gloucestershire.

Documents filed with Cotswold district council reveal plans for a home with 11
bedrooms and servants’ quarters, a boules pitch, croquet lawn, fruit cages,
stables, tennis court and underground swimming pool. The main house will
have a billiards and cinema room, gun storage area and wine cellar.

An early planning application by Yiangou Architects on behalf of Ritblat and
his wife Joanna in 2011 said the project was inspired by “classical country
house tradition, picking up references to architectural details found in
some of