Thatched House Lodge, the Charming Home of Princess Alexandra of Kent

Thatched House Lodge is a private royal residence where Princess Alexandra of Kent, a cousin of Queen Elizabeth II, now lives. This Grade II-listed property was built as two houses in 1673 for  two keepers of Richmond Park. It was then called Aldridge Lodge. Sometime in the 1720s, the house was enlarged  for Sir Robert Walpole, the country’s first prime minister, until the two houses were merged by Sir John Soane in 1771. This was the time when the house was renamed as Thatched House Lodge.  

The house served as a grace-and-favour home for succeeding members of the Royal Household. Royal staffers who lived here included General Sir Edward Bowater, who  was Prince Albert’s equerry, and, after him, General Lynedoch Gardiner, who served as an aide to Queen Victoria. Later, Sir Frederick Treves spent his retirement here after he successfully operated King Edward VII's appendix in 1902. The king also awarded the house to Sir Edmund Monson when he retired from the diplomatic service in 1905. Thatched House Lodge ceased to be a grace and favour property after the 5th Duke of Sutherland obtained a leasehold on the property in the 1930s. During World War II, U.S. General Dwight D. Eisenhower was allotted a suite there.

The property was later acquired by Princess Alexandra’s husband, Sir Angus Ogilvy, in 1963, shortly after their wedding. He refused a grace and favour residence offered by Queen Elizabeth II and instead subleased the property from Clare, Duchess of Sutherland for a princely sum of £150,000. He finally bought-out the leasehold which ran  until 1994. The Crown Estate granted Ogilvy an extension of the lease, to run for 150 years from 1994. He paid another £670,000 on premium plus an annual rent of £1,000 for the first 25 years, rising in defined stages every 25 years to £6,000 per annum for the last 25 years. The Ogilvys have already spent a fortune during the 40 years of their occupation on the property.

 Thatched House Lodge features six reception rooms and six bedrooms amidst four acres of grounds. The property also includes gardens, an 18th-century two-room thatched summer house which gave the main house its name, a gardener’s cottage, stabling and other buildings.