While the Cap Ferrat and Cap d’Antibes battle it out on the glamour
stakes in southern France, another Cap is staking a claim on the
property map of the world’s global wealthy: Cap de Formentor in
Mallorca.
What Formentor lacks in proximity to the airport (Palma is over an hour’s drive, and the last 10 minutes of hairpin bends aren’t ideal for anyone prone to car sickness) it makes up for in charm, exclusivity and peacefulness. Far off the tourist map, there’s only one narrow road that snakes through the national park, at the end of which is just a handful of houses and one, very long sandy beach (so no need to sunbathe on concrete pontoons).
Grace Kelly and Prince Rainier chose to spend some of their honeymoon at Hotel Formentor in the 1950s, but since that time the peninsular had fallen of the radar of the glitterati, up until now. Already, Lorenzo Fluxa, the founder of Mallorca’s most successful fashion export, Camper, has built a house there and one of Spain’s wealthiest businessmen also owns a summer house.
But the bar is set to raise a rung or two higher with the launch last week of a newly built house by the British entrepreneur-turned-property developer, Tim de Rosen. The house is an awesome glass edifice. Entered on the second level, the floor-to-ceiling Rimadesio glass doors on the double height living room open out across a epee decked terrace and directly over the bay of Formentor.
‘I was sitting in Cadogan Gardens, surfing the internet when I discovered that this plot of land was for sale,’ explains Mr de Rosen. ‘That was on a Saturday and by Monday I’d already put down the deposit.’ Having previously built houses in St Barts, Mr de Rosen decided to ‘specialise in building the best properties in the best areas,’ but the Formentor house remains his biggest project to date.
The house is fully kitted out to marry up with the tastes of today’s portfolio buyer and de Rosen isn’t ashamed that the market he’s targeting is someone who is looking for the perfect trophy property. Brand names abound throughout the house: Gaggenau appliances in the Valcucine kitchen, Lutron lighting system and Creston control panels (to remotely control lighting, audio-visual and security) and a Dornbracht rain shower in the master bathroom which ‘probably costs retail about £16,000 to £17,000 alone,’ says de Rosen.
The basement will have a 12-seater cinema which can be retracted (using hydraulics) to make room for a dance floor complete with glitter ball. Meanwhile, the wine cellar have a suspended transparent floor under which will sit crushed glass and corks ‘so that you can walk over your Château Petrus’.
Security on the island is generally considered to be much less of an issue than on the French Riviera, but this house can be monitored via close circuit TV cameras which are accessible via a mobile telephone or over the Internet. The house has fingerprint entry at the main gate and front door.
‘This house would be an ideal for an art lover,’ says de Rosen. ‘ We’re selling the house fully furnished so the only thing will be left to do here will be cover the walls with some great pictures.’
The Formentor House is on the market for guide price €20 million through Engel & Voelkers (www.mallorca-nord.com) and Savills associate on the island MJC Associates (contact Savills International on +44 (0)20 020 7016 3740; www.savills.co.uk/abroad or +34 971 57 99 57 )
