Sir David and Victoria Beckham’s ambition to embellish their picturesque Cotswolds estate has had cold water plunged over them by the local council.
The celebrity couple purchased the nine-bedroom mansion in the English countryside in 2016 for £6.15million and have since transformed this farmhouse in Great Tew, Chipping Norton, doubling its worth.
Over the past decade, they have added a built-in ‘Estonian’ sauna, plunge pool, football pitch, gym and swimming pool as well as several recreational rooms including a games room and cinema.
All this means that it’s now worth a cool £12m. A tidy sum for the ex-footballer and fashion designer, whose combined net worth is $673m (£506m), according to the Sunday Times’ 2025 Rich List.
Although they split their time between London, Miami, Beverly Hills, and Dubai, the Cotswolds remains their homebase, and featured heavily in the hit Netflix documentary Beckham, which stepped inside their lives.
Their most recent strike of inspiration has been to create a ‘west elevation of the west wing’ by adding an ‘oak-framed balcony’, according to their planning agent.
But, despite seeming somewhat innocuous on the page, the plans have been outright shut down by the council.
Planning officer Nathan Harris raised his concern it ‘would detract from the simple agricultural character and form’ of the property.
He added that although the residence wasn’t listed… the proposal would fail to conserve and enhance the building,’ according to the Daily Mail.
Meanwhile, the council’s senior conservation and design officer, Bryan Martin, blasted the balcony as a ‘non starter’ and pointed out it would ‘obscure the threshing doorway – a characteristic feature’.
Ultimately concluding that there is ‘no obvious way to do anything like it’. It’s unclear what the Beckhams will try next to push the plan forward.
The blow comes just a month after David was asked to remove the ‘fire pit’ on the island in his man-made lake by an ecologist.
And these are just two of many renovation proposals this year facing backlash. In March, the Beckhams wanted to add pond lighting, and locals were quick to push back, worried it would cause light pollution and disturb the local wildlife.
Even going as far as to dub the idea akin to turning their land into Blackpool Illuminations. Brutal.
The parents-of-four also have their own familial troubles to navigate as their rift with eldest son Brooklyn rumbles on.
Although the now LA-based aspiring chef, who lives there with his wife Nicola Peltz, has had no contact with his family for several months now, they have continued to acknowledge him during family celebrations.
Most recently, Victoria praised her ‘four amazing children’ in an Instagram post celebrating 27 years of marriage to David.