Court rules Kensington 'candy-cane' house stripes can stay

A High Court judge quashed a council notice ordering for the townhouse to be painted white

A woman who decorated her London townhouse with red and white stripes can ignore a council order to repaint it, the High Court has ruled.

Property developer Zipporah Lisle-Mainwaring painted the candy stripes on the building in Kensington in 2015.

The Royal Borough of Kensington and Chelsea said it was out of keeping with the look of the area and had served her with a notice to repaint it white.

Mr Justice Gilbart ruled the stripy decoration was "entirely lawful".

The council had served the notice under the Town and Country Planning Act 1990 claiming the "stripes on the front elevation, is incongruous with... the local area."

Ms Lisle-Mainwaring, 71, launched a judicial review at the High Court after failed appeals to magistrates and Isleworth Crown Court in 2016.

Explaining his ruling earlier, Mr Justice Gilbart said: "In my judgment, to allow a local planning authority (LPA) to use section 215 to deal with questions of aesthetics, as opposed to disrepair or dilapidation, falls outside the intention and spirit of the Planning Code," he said.

"I am therefore of the view that it is an improper use of Section 215 to use it to alter a lawful painting scheme," he ruled.

Ms Lisle-Mainwaring has previously denied she had painted the stripes to spite neighbours who objected to her plans to demolish the property and replace it with a new dwelling and two-storey basement.