Why did Harry Styles flee chef Jamie Oliver's £15m north London home?

Jamie Oliver and Harry Styles (PA/AP)
Jamie Oliver and Harry Styles (PA/AP)

Jamie Oliver has revealed how an item in his north London home scared Harry Styles off when the One Direction star was considering whether to buy the mansion.

The chef now lives in his native Essex with his wife Jools and their five children: daughters Honey Rosie, Daisy Boo Pamela and Petal Blossom Rainbow, and sons Buddy Bear Maurice and River Rocket.

Before relocating, they lived in north London and when they tried to sell the pad, Styles soon emerged as a possible buyer.

Unfortunately, one of Oliver’s daughters had a personal possession that appeared to put the singer off.

Jools and Jamie Oliver (Getty Images for AELTC)
Jools and Jamie Oliver (Getty Images for AELTC)

Oliver said (via the Daily Mail): “I’m not mates with Harry Styles, but I have met him a couple of times.

“One time was when I had put my house up for sale and he came for an inspection.

“He didn’t know that my daughter had a life-sized [cardboard] cut-out of him in her bedroom. He just sort of looked at it, turned around and said, ‘Argh!’ and left the house very quickly.”

The TV chef hasn’t revealed which of his daughters — now in their teens and early twenties — was the Directioner in question.

Thankfully, Oliver and his wife soon found a buyer — selling the property to the estate of the late ‘King of Soho’ Paul Raymond for £15m, the Daily Mail reported.

The Oliver family’s Essex mansion has 70 acres of land. They bought the 16th-century mansion in 2019 for £6m.

Meanwhile, Styles has properties in north London, Los Angeles and New York.

He bought his latest London property in 2020, paying just over £4m for a third house on the same Hampstead street as his other two. This brought his total investment in the area to more than £15m.