Holland Park provides a lesson in restrictive covenants, says Andrew Francis
It is rare for High Court litigation about restrictive covenants over freehold land to affect a particular property more than once. One instance of this is the revisiting of the well-known principles in Tulk v Moxay (1848) (concerning covenants protecting Leicester Square) just over 140 years later in R v Westminster City Council ex parte Leicester Square Coventry Street Association in 1989 ((1989) 59 P&CR 51) where the same covenants were in issue.
A more recent example, and the subject of this article, is the litigation over a small, but valuable piece of land (the property) adjoining 89 Holland Park (No. 89), in west London, suitable for building a house. The property first came to fame among lawyers when a dispute over a covenant to build a wall between No. 89 and the property was heard by Oliver J in March 1977. His judgment in Radford v De Froberville [1977] 1 WLR 1262 remains the locus classicus on the measure of damages
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