Ringo Prepares for His Old Age (1986)

 

Ringo Prepares for His Old Age

No Writer Listed

Reading Evening Post

August 27, 1986

    Former Beatle Ringo Starr is planning his retirement home. Ringo will be 46 soon, and with the children growing up, he's looking ahead to old age. So he has drawn up plans to build a retirement home, but it will be a cut above most people's dreams.

     The luxury villa will be set in its own grounds in a corner of Tittenhurst Park, the heavily guarded estate he owns in exclusive Sunningdale near Maidenhead. An application for planning permission to build the villa in the 80-acre park has been submitted to Windsor and Maidenhead Borough Council, which is due to debate the scheme tomorrow.

     A borough council spokesman said there is a recommendation from the officers to refuse the application because the site lies within a green belt. The plan is due to go before Berkshire County Council planners next month, and they are also being urged to turn it down.

     Ringo's solicitor, Mr. John Hemingway, said, "The villa would be in a segregated part of the estate on the site of a former house, so we live in hope that the planners will agree to the scheme.

     "It would be a natural development. The application has been submitted by Mr. Starkey's trustees. The thinking is long term. His oldest son has already married, and the other children are growing up. Probably the existing house will be far too big for Mr. Starkey and his wife in years to come. It is sensible to start planning an alternative home now. The family is growing up, and he is looking to the future."

     Ringo, who has three children from his first marriage, is married to actress Barbara Bach, who has a daughter from her first marriage; he has owned Tittonhurst Park for some years and lives in a large mansion patrolled by security guards and dogs. The estate is screened by electrified fencing. Mr. Hemingway thought Ringo would sell or lease the mansion and move into the new villa.