A Jacobean mansion owned by Morrison's supermarket director Chris Blundell has gone on the market for a cool £1.5 million.

Seventeenth century Kildwick Hall, an eight-bedroom mansion, near Skipton, with panoramic views across the Aire Valley, was restored to a family home by Mr Blundell who bought it in 1991.

The Morrison's business development director, who lives there with his wife and four children, is the nephew of 67-year-old Bradford supermarket chief Ken Morrison whose family is among the richest in the country.

In the Sunday Times rich list, the Morrison family fortune ballooned last year by £250 million to £900 million and is tipped to reach a billion next year.

Kildwick Hall, a Grade II* listed building which was the home of Sir John Brigg, MP for Keighley between 1895 and 1911, was converted to a hotel and country club in 1947.

But Councillor Eric Dawson (Con, Craven) said he hoped the sale would not jeopardise the historic significance of the building which sold for just £6,000 in 1967.

He said: "It is part of local history. I'm not concerned whether it stays as a family home or becomes a business again, so long as the fabric of the building is maintained. It is important that the structure is conserved."

In the early 1970s, when Kildwick Hall was taken over by the owners of the famous Box Tree restaurant in Ilkley, it was voted Egon Ronay restaurant of the year.

Later, it was run as a high class French restaurant by Frenchman Patrick Benrezkellah, but it lasted only 12 months. He left claiming Yorshiremen did not appreciate French cooking and were too tight-fisted.

Owners in the 1980s ran the hotel and restaurant for about six years before it was bought by a former Bradford policeman and his wife who had it for about nine months.

The last owners in the early 1990s went into receivership in 1991 and a number of treasures went under the auctioneer's hammer to meet unpaid bills.

One painting was sold for £4,800 to the Scottish National Portrait Gallery, while some furniture went to a chateaux in Calais, France.

In 1920 the hall was used as the setting for Thrushcross Grange in the silent movie version of Emily Bronte's Wuthering Heights.

It is set in 80 acres and boasts a listed Palladian pavilion incorporating a staff flat and a gym.

It has a separate three-bedroom cottage and a stable block big enough for 16 horses.

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