Inside the £4million mega cellar that will cost City boss £825,000 in council fees

• Reade Griffith intends to install swimming pool, spa and cinema in basement
• The development is expected to take two years to complete
  

By Keith Gladdis for the Daily Mail

Published: 01:51 EST, 23 August 2013 | Updated: 02:50 EST, 23 August 2013

The plans reveal the extent of the enormous development that Reade Griffith wants beneath his mansion

This is the vast two-storey basement that is costing a wealthy hedge fund manager £825,000 in council fees – on top of £4million to build it.

The plans reveal the extent of the enormous development – equivalent to the size of 20 two-bedroom flats – that Reade Griffith wants beneath his mansion.

He intends to install a swimming pool, spa, wine store, cinema and games room under the existing building and gardens.

An ‘appropriately designed’ first floor extension is also proposed.

The entire 1,130 square metre project is expected to take two years to complete at an estimated cost of £4million to Mr Griffith, 48, and his 42-year-old wife Elizabeth. But the vast scale of the work, on two four-storey villas in London’s Notting Hill, means it has fallen foul of rules that normally apply only to commercial developments.

In order to win planning permission Mr Griffith, a former US Marine who has an estimated fortune of £55million, has agreed to pay Kensington and Chelsea Council £825,000 towards social housing in his community.

Under Section 106 of the Town and Country Planning Act developers are required to make a contribution on any project bigger than 800 square metres.

A typical new home in London is around 102 square metres.

The payment is in addition to a £20,625 ‘monitoring fee’, a £42,500 community infrastructure levy to the Greater London Authority and a £337 planning application fee.

A member of staff at the property, listed as a ‘building of local interest’, said yesterday that the couple are currently in the US. A spokesman for Mr Griffith’s company Polygon Investment Partners, which has offices in Belgravia and New York, said he was not available to comment. However a friend of Mr Griffith said he was ‘surprised’ by the fee.

The entire 1,130 square metre project is expected to take two years to complete at an estimated cost of £4million

The development is the latest  in a growing trend for ‘iceberg’ homes where projects dig down below ground to create more space than traditional extensions.

Planning applications for basement extensions in Kensington and Chelsea have soared from 13 in 2001 to 307 last year.

The huge excavation necessary for the project is likely to cause major disruption to neighbouring properties with scores of lorries removing earth from the site.

One neighbour said: ‘It will certainly be one of the “iceberg houses” and sadly, our house will probably be the Titanic.’

Kensington and Chelsea Council yesterday said the £825,000 figure had been suggested by the developer and was later agreed by  planning officials.

A spokesman said: ‘It is very unusual for a Section 106 Agreement to apply to a domestic development but this is a very large project.’ Property experts suggested the couple may be keen to start the project before new rules are introduced reducing the size of subterranean developments.

The vast scale of the work, on two four-storey villas in London's Notting Hill, means it has fallen foul of rules that normally apply only to commercial developments

Richard Barber, partner at developers WA Ellis, said: ‘I’m shocked at the size of the extension and the size of the fee they’re suggesting. It’s well out of the range of normal extensions. They’re obviously trying to get this in before the big change in October.

‘Kensington and Chelsea are reducing the amount of area that you can create under a garden. We’ll likely be seeing a rush of others doing this before the deadline.’ The development is expected to add around £10million to the value of the combined property, which already has a total of 13 bedrooms.

Once finished the property will be worth an estimated £50million, making it one of the most expensive in one of the most fashionable areas in London.

The project was applied for in the name of Mrs Griffith, who owns one of the properties. Her husband owns the neighbouring house through a company.