Haute bohemians Francesco Boglione, a former insurance broker, and his Australian ex-model wife Gael had bought the adjoining mansion, Petersham House, in 1997 after a tip-off from their friend Mick Jagger. When the garden nursery next to it came up for sale in 2004, they bought that too, to stop anything happening there they didn’t like and, although they had no garden centre experience, accidentally found themselves creating a rus in urbe idyll, selling a lush dream of flowers, rusticated antiques and bucolic lifestyle, incorporating a café and restaurant.
