ENGINE ROOM, GET ME MY DRINK!
The richest man in the Ukraine has just purchased the most expensive flat in Britain. The price tag…wait for it, 136 million pounds - POUNDS, not dollars. You can practically go ahead and double that for those of you in the U.S of A. Apparently this bit of retail therapy does not even make a dent in this man’s multi billion-dollar fortune. Even more sobering – and frightening - is that this is not the world’s most expensive flat. I’m thinking it must be in Nebraska somewhere...maybe Essex.
So what do you get for that price tag you ask? Well for starters, fortress like security with iris recognition systems in the elevators, panic rooms, and bullet-proof glass. Gosh, paranoid much? I suppose if you in fact have that much money and come from certain parts of the world where crime syndicates are still thriving, someone out there wants your head on a plate. Might as well have the full James Bond set up. Then within this flat there are 15 types of marble as well as ‘whole forests’ of felled European oak. The environment be damned apparently when there are luxury flats to be built.
The building also has a private cinema – it damn well better for that amount of money – a 21 meter swimming pool, a gym, golf simulator (cause when you’re that rich apparently going outside to mix with the fray seems commonplace and unappealing), a wine cellar, a valet service, concierge and an underground passage to wonder chef Heston Blumenthal’s restaurant. No offense, but if I were to shell out over a hundred million dollars for somewhere to live, I want ol’ Heston in my very own kitchen asking me and the King what we’d like for breakfast. Yo Heston, mashed banana and oatmeal for the King and make it snappy!
And of course, no egregiously expensive penthouse would be complete without panoramic views over Hyde Park. Again, for that price tag, forget the panoramic views, please, that’s so cliched. I would like to actually be hovering OVER Hyde Park; I mean, right in the center with a glass floor so that I can look down upon the swan pond – as I like to call it. Come to think of it, the flat should also move like some flying spaceship so that I can change my view at a moment’s whim. This is not so much to ask when you will also have to pay stamp duty on this abode!
It of course also got me thinking about what the world’s most decadent flat should contain, or at least what would justify such an expense. Let’s see, perhaps gold heated floors…a 24 hour on call fleet of butlers that would bring, cook or clean absolutely anything at a moments notice…a steam shower, a closet the size of Russia, equipped with skinny mirrors of course, a state of the art audio system that turns on when I enter a room and shout out a song, any song…actually, forget the stereo system, for that amount of money I’d want the actual band beamed into my living room like on Star Trek….oh, and the King has suggested an entire room made out of rubber and foam so that he can crawl around without whacking his head on anything. The boy does have simple, but very practical tastes.