EDEN CONFIDENTIAL: Locals inflict home defeat on Beckham grand design

EDEN CONFIDENTIAL: Locals inflict a home defeat on Beckham’s grand design

He scores success after success away from home, especially in the U.S. where his team, Inter Miami, notched up a thrilling, last-gasp win last month — thanks to a free-kick by Argentinian captain Lionel Messi, watched by a crowd which included Serena Williams and Kim Kardashian.

But David Beckham enjoys rather less acclaim when he and his wife, Victoria, are back in the Cotswolds, where they own a sprawling barn conversion at Great Tew.

After snapping up the property for £6 million in 2016, the Beckhams added a plunge pool and separate swimming pool, plus a tennis court which was later converted into a football pitch with ‘a viewing platform’ — or, as appalled Oxfordshire locals prefer to describe it, its own stand.

Though powerless to prevent those developments, locals have now defeated the Beckhams’ latest proposal, submitted to the local council in June, which envisaged a new access road — the best part of 300 yards long or the length of three football pitches — being cut through unblemished country to a new greenhouse.

Howls of anguish immediately followed. ‘There is already an access road to the property, so what is the point of laying another road just to build a fancy greenhouse?’ asked one critic, lambasting the proposal as ‘pointless and a waste of resources’.

David Beckham and his wife Victoria at the Cotswolds, where they own a barn conversion

The Beckhams have now withdrawn their application. I fear, alas, that it won’t be enough to endear them to their neighbours.

‘I am always amazed,’ chunters one of these, ‘at those who come to live in the countryside and then want to bring in suburbia. Capability Brown would never have designed a garden with . . . a huge football pitch, a spectator stand, an outdoor pool and a sauna.

‘I am surprised they have not applied for a funfair ride.’

With his taste for skintight jumpsuits, feather boas, towering platform shoes and androgynous style, David Bowie is remembered as much for his fashion sense as his music.

And now the pop star’s daughter, Alexandria Zahra Jones, 23, is trying to be a trend-setter herself.

Known as Lexi, she has launched an art and clothing label selling quirky prints priced at more than £400 and pullovers emblazoned with the brand’s logo, ALXX.

Lexi — whose mother is Bowie’s widow, the supermodel Iman — says: ‘I have struggled with my mental health for most of my life, so art has always been a coping mechanism of mine to get out of dark places.’

Alexandria Zahra Jones, now 29, pictured as a toddler with father David Bowie

The pop star’s daughter, known as Lexi, has launched a new art and clothing label

Nicholas Evans — whose novel The Horse Whisperer sold more than 15 million copies and was turned into a Hollywood film starring Robert Redford — has ensured his widow is extremely rich.

I can reveal that Evans, who died last August at the age of 72, left a fortune of £10.3 million.

Newly published probate documents disclose that he made bequests of £5,000 each to his grandchildren, and to his two step-grandchildren. The rest of his estate was left on trust for his second wife, Charlotte.

He and singer-songwriter Charlotte survived accidental poisoning in 2008 when he picked mushrooms for a lunch at her brother’s estate in Scotland. Instead of ceps, he had picked poisonous webcaps. He, Charlotte and her brother all needed dialysis.

While some people wear swimsuits in their holiday snaps, Will Astor and his wife, Lohralee, opted for something more unusual.

Will — the son of Annabel Astor, mother of Samantha Cameron — and former model Lohralee dressed as if they were in the Alps while on holiday in Scotland. He wore lederhosen while she was in a dirndl.

‘I am half Swiss,’ explains Lohralee. She tells me: ‘We were just having a celebration and it is nice to hold on to some old-fashioned traditions.’

She and Will, 44, were on holiday with Kirstie Allsopp’s cousins, hedge funder Jamie and fashionista Kathryn Allsopp.

Will Astor and his wife Lohralee dressed as if they were in the Alps while on holiday in Scotland

TV homes guru Sarah Beeny sometimes gets confused by the relationships in her family.

The Property Ladder star, 51, met her husband and business partner, Graham Swift, when she was 18. Her brother, Diccon, is married to Swift’s sister, Caroline. ‘It was Diccon who introduced me to Graham,’ she explains. ‘They’ve got four children and we’ve got four children.

‘I remember on their wedding day, we woke up [and] I said to Graham, ‘Oh, gosh, it’s a bit embarrassing because today you become my brother-in-law.’ And that was so weird.’ She adds: ‘But I’m very lucky I have a lovely family. We all get on incredibly well.’

Petronella Wyatt was not impressed by the dance moves on display at Notting Hill Carnival. ‘Twerking’ is one of the ugliest dance moves ever invented,’ declares the daughter of Lord (Woodrow) Wyatt. Journalist Petronella, a former lover of Boris Johnson, adds: ‘There is something deeply unattractive about a woman shoving her butt in people’s faces.’ 

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