When Meta finally opened its long-awaited new office complex in King’s Cross last week, who should rock up to cut the ribbon? None other than Prince Charles and Camilla, Duchess of Cornwall.
The new digs will house 4,000 employees of the tech-giant-formerly-known-as-Facebook, who will be mainly working on its new virtual reality products, including its attempt to monopolise the metaverse. So Charles, who prefers to give homeopathic treatments to his pot plants, might seem a strange choice. But, look! There is our future king debating the finer points of blockchain technology with Meta’s top computer programmers!
At least on this occasion it went more smoothly than the last time Charles gave a VR headset a spin, back in 2018. His Royal Highness, filmed by ITV News, said it made him feel “very dizzy”, before miming falling over and exclaiming: “Clonk!”
Perhaps, with their newly discovered love of tech, Charles and Camilla will soon have a palace built in the ’verse? At least it would be cheaper to heat than Clarence House.
Yes, but is it art?
Scotland’s former first minister has fallen foul of planning rules after putting up a piece of art in his garden.
Alex Salmond, who now leads the pro-Scottish independence Alba Party, said the artwork, “carved from driftwood by local Strichen man Mike Morgan”, was “not going anywhere”. This is despite Aberdeenshire Council saying he didn’t have planning permission for a political statement and required advertising consent. Nonsense, rages Salmond. “Bureaucratic silliness” from “pettifogging officialdom”.
Of course it isn’t a political advert, it is art. It just happens to be painted with the word “Yes” and looks exactly like the logo from the 2014 independence campaign. Perhaps whoever dobbed him in should just stick up a large “No” sign next door? In the name of art, obviously.
Life’s a beach in Manchester
Picture the scene: after strolling through acres of lush jungle vegetation, you plunge down a “living waterslide” to a glittering beach, where the sun sparkles on the sand all year long. Perhaps later you’ll have a snowball fight, or a cocktail made from local honey. It could be paradise. Or Manchester.
Peel is about to submit new plans for Therme Manchester, and we are excited. Let’s just hope the “lush vegetation” isn’t supplied by the same guys who did the Marble Arch Mound.
Fracking hell
Business secretary Kwasi Kwarteng really wants the UK to start fracking for shale gas again. And he is fairly certain that it won’t cause earthquakes. Just to be sure, he has asked the British Geological Society to do a three-month review of the evidence.
Would that be the evidence that previously showed that fracking does cause earthquakes, damages properties and pollutes aquifers? Maybe something has changed? Or maybe Kwarteng was swayed by the US Geological Survey, which concluded that “most induced earthquakes are not directly caused by fracking”.
Still, we wouldn’t want to bet the house (or office, or high street) on it.
Get Carter, now on TikTok!
Expect British Land to up its game on social media this year. Apparently, back in the heady days of “eat out to help out”, some up-and-coming (read: under the age of 40) members of staff spotted BL’s campuses in the background of a whole host of TikTok videos. But poor old BL didn’t get so much as a look-in on the hashtags, did it.
We hear suggestions are now being put forward to improve the firm’s visibility on social media. Are we the only ones hoping for CEO Simon Carter to take to TikTok and bust some moves? Unless, that is, he is already on there? Could he be SimonCarter07, with 224,000 followers, 5.7m likes and a penchant for Will Smith? If Canada Water suddenly pops up in the background, we’ll know for sure.
Watching the clock
Meanwhile, TikTok is still on the hunt for space after a rumoured deal to move into a London WeWork office fell through. But what was it that put the firm off WeWork’s space? Did it watch the teaser for WeCrashed on the day it was meant to sign, and got spooked? Or was it just that the social media giant’s Chinese owners “didn’t like” the flex company as a landlord, after its roller-coaster past few years?
Whatever the reason, time is running out for TikTok to find a 100,000 sq ft office in the City. Leasing agents: the clock is ticking.
Time wasting
Talking of time, it now takes an average of 129 days, or 4.2 months, to sell a home in the UK. But if you don’t have the time for that, HBB Solutions has some suggestions for things that would take less time.
Walking from Land’s End to John o’ Groats at a leisurely pace would only take around 90 days, it points out. Or you could go on a cruise. In fact, you could fully circumnavigate the planet, stopping at the sights, in just 120 days. And a bit of discipline and five hours’ study a day will have you fluent in German, French, Italian or Spanish in less than four months. Imagine what you could do in the time it takes to sell an office portfolio!
Share your tales from the quirky side of the property industry by e-mailing diary@eg.co.uk
