A street in London’s affluent Holland Park has become embroiled in a neighbour feud centred on plans for a luxury underground cinema.
Photographer Piers Calvert and his downstairs neighbour Lisa Erickson, a former banker turned choral singer, are fighting against another apartment owner in their building, The Independent reported.
The dispute erupted after the neighbour unveiled plans to construct a basement beneath the communal garden of the property where they all own flats.
The five-storey Victorian building is on the same street as David and Victoria Beckham’s main London residence, which they paid £31.5 million ($60 million) for in 2013.
The enclave, known informally as ‘Millionaires’ Row’, is also home to Elton John, Simon Cowell and Robbie Williams.
Calvert and Erickson have taken the lower-ground-floor owner to the High Court through a freehold and residents’ management company of which both are directors.
At the heart of the case is just how far down ownership of the land extends and whether the owner holds the legal authority to excavate beneath the garden.
The lower flat is leased by Jersey-registered company Montana International Properties Ltd, whose owners have not been publicly disclosed.
Lawyers representing the residents’ company argue that while Montana retains the right to use the garden, that title does not extend indefinitely underground.
“The demise of the garden does not carry with it the subsoil to the centre of the earth or to any level beyond that reasonably required for use as a garden,” the residents’ company’s barrister David Nicholls told The Sun .
“The subsoil at 20 feet or 100 feet or 1000 feet below the surface cannot properly be said to be ‘garden’,” he added.
Planning permission was granted in 2018 for a single-storey basement extending 2.5 metres beneath the garden, designed to house a gym, private cinema, shower room and storage.
However, Calvert and Erickson maintain that council planning approval does not grant the legal right to dig into the ground.
Nicholls reportedly told High Court judge Master Francesca Kaye that the specific wording of Montana’s lease was important, as it referred strictly to a “garden”, rather than “land”, which would ordinarily encompass the soil beneath it.
Montana’s barrister, Daniel Dovar, disagreed, arguing that the lease did not come with any depth restrictions on the company’s rights.
He told the court the core issue was “whether the garden extends below the subsoil and if so how far”.
“Montana contends it is sufficient to develop an underground basement area, Holland Park contends that it is not,” The Independent quoted Dovar as saying.
Dovar submitted that the garden was included in the lease without limitations and that this would naturally include the ground beneath it.
“The demise is of the whole garden, which naturally includes all the subsoil,” he told the court.
“There is nothing in the lease which provides any alternative construction.”
He also pointed to how ownership of land generally extends to the airspace above and the ground below.
The identity of Montana’s owners remains a mystery, with lawyers for both sides yet to reveal who is behind the offshore company or who currently occupies the downstairs apartment.
Following a three-day hearing in London’s High Court, Kaye reserved her decision, leaving neighbours waiting to learn whether the cinema plans can go ahead.
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