Wealthy Londoners dig deep for space to call their own

Britain is not immune from the housing slump,but in a city that has some of the richest people and most expensive real estate in the world,well-off homeowners who have exhausted the traditional methods of home expansion build up,or build out are enthusiastically branching out the only other way possible: down.

Far beneath Londons surface,and to their neighbours considerable chagrin,they are using enormous machines to remove thousands of tons of dirt and replace it with new structures extending as many as four floors down.

They are building not just swimming pools,but also cinemas,recreation centres,gyms,wine cellars,bowling alleys,squash courts,climbing walls,servants quarters,saunas,waterfalls,Jacuzzis,hair salons and multicar garages with special elevators to shuttle vintage car collections up and down.

A good way of looking at it is to think of the super-yacht market, explained John Lees,chairman of Lees Associates,who regularly works on projects costing tens of millions of dollars. His underground pools,he said,have included one in which a film of moving sharks is projected on the walls while the Jaws theme song plays and another covered in hand-made golden ceramic tiles embedded with tiny lights that twinkle and give swimmers the feeling of being enveloped in the night sky.

You know the kind of kit they have and how big they are,and they keep getting bigger and bigger? he said,referring to yachts of the rich and famous. In London,a densely populated city,you need to find a way to go. And so down you go.

Well be able to wake up in the morning,swim for half an hour,exercise,and you dont have to get stuck in traffic, said Ravji Halai,54,a building-supplies tycoon who is building a gym,a bar and a heated swimming pool (with jet action) under his house in Hendon,North London.