Actor Sean Bean, a long term resident of Belsize Park

Published: 20 March, 2014
By DAN CARRIER

PEOPLE living in a leafy Belsize Park enclave fear they will soon look out of their windows and see Boromir from Lord of the Rings looking back at them.

They say actor Sean Bean, who played Tolkien’s brave warrior character, risks invading his neighbours’ privacy with a plan for a new roof terrace at his home, which is a short walk from Haverstock Hill.

The home improvement plan was rejected by Camden Council’s building control department last year but Mr Bean has appealed to a planning inspector in the hope that the refusal will be overturned. 

“This will mean a loss of privacy. All the facing windows are bedroom windows,” one neighbour said in a written objection.

Another added: “This terrace is highly intrusive, prominently sited and highly visible from all around. This is the second or third time our neighbour Mr Bean has asked to have the terrace on his second floor altered. We felt it impaired our privacy and took light away.”

The plans lodged at the Town Hall show a second-floor flat roof which Mr Bean wants to turn into a terrace and then screen using a mixture of olive, bay and laurel trees and a glass wall. Double doors would lead out of a bedroom straight onto the new terrace. 

Camden said that the project did “not enhance” the conservation area and risked “overlooking” the private spaces of neighbours.

The Belsize Park Conservation Area Advisory Committee were among the objectors.

Another objection from a neighbour adds that the actor’s home already has “a large garden, a large terrace at ground-floor level and another large terrace at first-floor level”.

But a close neighbour of Mr Bean, who has also appeared in the hit TV series Sharpe and Game Of Thrones, and as a James Bond baddie in Golden­eye, says the project should go ahead. 

The supporter wrote: “I have no objection to the glass balustrade, particularly since our terrace is at the same level, which we enjoy immensely. Since there are so many windows peering down on all our properties, the intended installation will offer additional privacy to both the applicant and his surroundings.”

A long-term resident of Belsize Park, Mr Bean has previously helped open school fetes and spoken out against the closure of popular pubs.

Architect David Mercer, who is working on the project, declined to comment. 

Documents supplied to the planning appeal dismissed the claim that privacy would be infringed, adding: “Given that the rooms concerned are either a bathroom which is not a habitable room or a room served by Velux windows – there can be no loss of privacy.” It added: “We do not accept that the proposals would result in a diminution of the character of the conservation area or detract from the host building or that they would result in overlooking, loss of daylight or amenity to adjoining properties. The proposals have been carefully prepared to overcome these identified concerns.”