As television’s most foul-mouthed chef, Gordon Ramsay is used to stirring things up.
But his latest spat has nothing to do with cooking – and this time he is the target of an angry outburst.
Ramsay has begun work on a luxury holiday home on the north Cornish coast. Residents in Rock were already dismayed that an influx of wealthy second home owners from London was turning the increasingly trendy resort into ‘Kensington-on-Sea’.
They have accused Ramsay and other wealthy outsiders of destroying their community. The chef, who is worth around £38million, fought a lengthy battle with neighbours before being granted permission to bulldoze a 1920s mansion he bought for £4.4million and replace it with a five-bedroom house with two kitchens, a swimming pool and a wine cellar, plus a three-bedroom grass-covered boathouse at the water’s edge 100 yards away.
Gordon Ramsay (pictured with wife Tana in 2015) has begun work on a luxury holiday home in Rock on the north Cornish coast
The chef, who is worth around £38million, fought a lengthy battle with neighbours before being granted permission to bulldoze a 1920s mansion he bought for £4.4million (pictured)
Work has begun on the project, which is in an Area of Outstanding Natural Beauty, and is expected to last months. Ramsay, 51, has meanwhile bought a £4million six-bedroom mansion in nearby Trebetherick as a ‘stopgap’ holiday home for himself, wife Tana, 43, and their children, Megan, 19, Jack, 18, Holly, 18, and Matilda, 16.
He also owns a three-storey townhouse in Fowey, 25 miles away on the south Cornish coast. The family’s main home is in London.
Anne Haynes, 60, who lived less than 50 yards from the building site in Rock, said: ‘It’s disgraceful and shouldn’t have been allowed.
‘He’s already got a house in Trebetherick, why does he want another one? Surely he could have just done a few modifications and left it at that. Rock is getting worse and worse every year and houses are going up everywhere.’
He will replace it with a five-bedroom house with two kitchens, a swimming pool and a wine cellar, plus a three-bedroom grass-covered boathouse at the water’s edge 100 yards away
Another resident, Ray Wall, 65, said holiday home owners are spoiling the town. ‘Round here “the August people” look at you like something on the bottom of the shoe,’ he said.
‘Second home owners think they can do anything. It’s a lovely area and it’s been destroyed.’
Kate Wall, 63, who lives opposite, said: ‘We don’t like the high gates all around here. People have all this money and houses that are empty most of the year. Fifteen per cent of the houses around here are lived in, there is no community.’
Rock is one of four parishes in Cornwall that have now restricted the purchase of second homes.
A representative for Ramsay did not return requests for comment.