But if the socialite lifestyle is not a top priority, this is also a property — in the words of Geller — that can help you fix your inner spiritual life.
The cinema room in Uri Geller's house, now for sale for £7.95m (Savills)
“I have strewn rock crystals all over my property that are millions of years old. One of them actually belonged to Albert Einstein, and that is in the rockery of our house… there is that ambiance, there’s energy, there is a power of healing,” he told me when we spoke in Tel Aviv this week. “Everything is energy, even rocks are energy. So definitely the person who will buy the house will no doubt live longer. I mean that seriously.”
The grand hallway at Sonning Court, the former residence of Uri Geller (Savills)
Though the celebrity magician lived there longer than any other of his homes, he left the UK in 2015 and is now selling the property for £7m less than it was originally listed for eight years ago.
The Drawing Room of Geller's home, now for sale (Savills)
“In every Israeli there’s an urge, almost a magnetic power, pulling you back to your homeland,” he said. “So I told Hannah, my wife, let’s go back to Israel. She said yes, she agreed. And we basically made aliyah back to Israel where I was born.”
“You come to a certain age where you want to turn a page in your life and I thought the best turning page would be coming back to my homeland to be with my people.”
His materialistic days behind him, he now lives in “a tiny apartment in old Jaffa with Ikea furniture.”
The house he is selling is “special” because it has “almost anything and everything that someone would like to have, from a helipad to 111m of mooring that we own. We own a part of the River Thames,” he said.
Access to the Thames from the property (Savills)
Equally remarkable is the fact that Geller’s career of spoon-bending has brought him such fabulous wealth. He has for decades performed his party-piece, either using only his psychic powers to harness “energy” — or an impressive sleight of hand and ability to distract attention, depending on who you ask.
The kitchen where Uri Geller keeps his spoons (Savills)
The first time Uri bent a spoon for me was when we were sipping coffee at the riverside home. With a cynical smile I handed him the teaspoon he’d given me with my cappuccino on which to demonstrate his powers, but he insisted he needed one of his other spoons or he’d end up going through all of his best cutlery.
The circular bath at Sonning Court (Savills)
Fair enough, I thought, and just as his assistant Shipi (who is also his brother-in-law) handed him the “special” spoon, he swooped it down towards the fireplace in a dramatic flurry of hand movements, declaring that proximity to metal would help. Sure enough, the spoon soon bent at its neck as he gently stroked it, and I can’t honestly say I know how he did it.
The drawing room and fire place of Uri Geller's mansion (Savills)
That very fireplace could now be yours, along with the rest of the unusual property in which Geller lived with his wife and two children for three decades.
The eccentric riverside residence boasts guest and staff accommodation, a heated outdoor swimming pool, a floodlit tennis court, landscaped gardens with waterfalls and a Japanese-style bridge, as well as a four-car garage. Oh, and a giant glass pyramid room in the garden he used for meditating and inspiring children suffering from terminal illnesses.
The Japanese garden bridge at Uri Geller's house (Savills)
I had visited him years ago to develop a TV format not dissimilar to The Apprentice, but instead of Alan Sugar and business, it would feature Uri and magic (working title: “The Sorcerer’s Apprentice”). My colleagues and I were among “not hundreds but thousands” of people who would visit him there, Geller said.
Might his protégé Lior Suchard, the Israeli illusionist and performer whose career he launched in a TV show very similar to the one we pitched him, be interested in buying the house? “That’s a good idea” he laughs, ever the salesman, “I’m going to send him the link to the house and tell him, ‘Do you want to be on every cover of newspapers around the world? Buy my house!’”
The gym at Sonning Court (Savills)
However sceptical one is about Uri, his unashamed enthusiasm and sense of fun are infectious. There’s no doubt he is an entertaining performer who continues to inspire people with a belief in the supernatural. So if you’ve got a spare few million and you’re hoping to benefit from the geographical echoes of his mystical energy, Sonning Court could be just the place for you to make your home.
“I can only assume — and use the word perhaps — whoever buys the house, will certainly have supernatural powers,” he said.
