What happened to Grand Designs' most expensive and infamous homes?

Yahoo

4 days ago

A Grand Designs house described as "the perfect home" has gone on the market for the first time.
Five-bedroom Green Dragon Barn in Blackawton, Devon, is on sale for £1.5m.
It first featured on the Channel 4 programme in 2001, and was revisited by the show in 2022 after 20 years of work from owners Sue Charman and Martin Whitlock.
The 4,600 sq ft property was created from three linked barns and has an "eco-conscious design." It is now on sale after Charman died in 2023, with Whitlock saying: "Sue was passionate about environmental issues and we were determined to make the house as natural and sustainable as possible. It was a matter of principle but also very much in the spirit of the building."
Here, Yahoo News UK looks at some of the most expensive, and infamous, homes to have also featured on the show.
Pavello, a 5,533 sq ft five-bedroom mansion, was the largest ever home featured on Grand Designs.
The property in Colgate, West Sussex, was on the programme in 2015 and built by Clinton Dall, a cleaning services business owner who bought the initial plot of land for £850,000 in 2013.
Presenter Kevin McCloud said the project risked "financial ruin' but it was ultimately successful, with him saying it was "modernist architecture at the top of its game… an absolutely exquisite experience".
Dall sold it for £3.45m in 2019 and it went on the market again five years later, selling for £3.95m in October last year.
Chesil Cliff House in Saunton, Devon, is one of the most expensive and infamous properties to have featured on the show.
The lighthouse, originally covered in 2019 and revisited in 2022, is considered one of the saddest stories to have been told on Grand Designs. It took 11 years to build, left its owner Edward Short in £7m of debt and cost him his marriage.
"It was a nightmare from the moment the first spade hit the ground," Short reflected last year. "We were up against it from day one, with the really vulnerable cliff in front of the house."
It was originally listed for £10m in 2022, but last year was on the market for nearly half that amount. It is not currently listed.
A 2016 episode told the story of Simon and Jasmine Dale, who set out to build an eco home in Pembrokeshire, Wales, with a budget of £500.
Perhaps unsurprisingly, they failed... but still managed to complete the project spending just £27,000.
However, it was destroyed by a fire in 2018, with the Dale family unhurt.
Dai Swan, from Mid and West Wales Fire and Rescue Service, said at the time: 'It's utterly heartbreaking for the crews seeing how much workmanship has gone into these [house] frames. Each piece of this building is bespoke, it's done to a beautifully high standard and to see it damaged by fire is just heartbreaking.'
A JustGiving page raised £35,271 for the couple.
Another property which went over budget - but on a bigger scale - was the so-called "Hux Shard" in Huxham, Devon, which featured on Grand Designs in 2021.
It was described as a home "that looks like a huge piece of art, with 34 enormous angled zinc shards".
Joe and Claire Priday's project cost four times its £835,000 budget at £2.5m.
And McCloud said they had 'more money than sense' when they spent £125,000 on the kitchen alone.
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