A Georgian town house measuring over 13,200 square foot and located in Marylebone in London has been put for rent at £112,000 or about N225m a month.
The house owned by Serena Rees co-founder of the lingerie company Agent Provocateur is reputed to have hosted some of London’s most glamorous parties since the 1800s.
The home was also the 1907 birthplace of British biochemist Rosalind Pitt-Rivers, who made scientific discoveries about thyroid hormones.
Rees carried on the house’s legacy as a place to entertain. She says hundreds of people have comfortably fit in her home during events. “We’ve had infamous parties here, which have been covered by the press, with most of the top models in the fashion world and top musicians,” she says. Rees doesn’t name names, but the afterparty for Kate Moss’s 30th birthday was reported to have taken place at her home.
Now, Rees has listed the property to rent with Daniel Daggers at DDRE Global for £112,000 ($145,000) a month. For that price, a tenant gets a historically significant 13,237-square-foot townhouse with seven bedrooms, five bathrooms, a one-car garage and an elevator.
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Rees says she will entertain offers from buyers, too, at the right place, but declines to put a number on what that number might be or share what she paid for the property when she purchased it.
Rees says the space feels too big for her these days. It’s just her and her dachshund, Peanut, now that her daughter has grown up and moved out. “There’s an element of me that thinks that I’ve had 25 wonderful years here—maybe it’s the end of my era here, and I should move on and let someone else enjoy it,” she says.
As to Agent Provocateur, Rees and her ex-husband Joseph Corré were reported to have sold a majority stake in the business to private equity group 3i in 2007 for some £60 million.
Inside the house
The five-floor home itself dates to the 1700s. As a listed building, it’s full of historic touches Rees loves. There are period marble fireplaces with intricate carvings, an original iron balustrade on the staircase and ornate painted ceilings that wouldn’t look out of place in an episode of Bridgerton.
“The ceilings are as they were in the period. We have the same paint colors—I even worked with a paint historian,” Rees says. She calls one living room the “ice cream room”: Its pastel colors remind her of the dessert.
Of the five stories, the basement has a self-contained studio with a kitchen, ideal for staff, as well as a home gym. The ground floor features a spacious entry hall and reception room that flows into an open-plan kitchen, with a separate chef’s kitchen tucked away behind a corner. In a rarity for the area, there’s also a plant-filled terrace on this floor, giving outside space and a sense of privacy in central London.
The next floor up has two reception rooms Rees has used for parties, and two separate studies, which Daggers says has been a popular request in house searches—“his and hers offices” in the era of working from home.
Above that, is the primary bedroom and a spacious dressing room that’s bigger than the bedroom. “I’ve probably designed over a hundred retail stores worldwide, and I know how you want to see clothes and access them,” Rees says. “So I had great fun designing my own dressing room.”
On the next floor up are five guest bedrooms, several with en-suites, and a sitting room. There’s also an additional mezzanine level with a library.
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The town house is located on a quiet street in the heart of Marylebone, a 7-minute walk from Oxford Street station and a short stroll from Regent’s Park.
“Marylebone wasn’t quite as smart, as fashionable as it is now when I came here 25 years ago. It was really handy for the dentist and the doctor but that was it,” Rees says. “But now it’s incredible.” She says she and Peanut go to the weekly farmer’s market in Marylebone and enjoy all the independent shops in the area.
Rees says the house’s 13,000 square feet would suit a big family or another creative person who loves entertaining and throwing big parties. But she’s ready to move on. “I’ve been lucky to be here and enjoy this house for so long,” she says. “There are of course other really big houses in London,” she adds. “But they’re not built by Robert Adam.”
