Dua Lipa's mega renovations will cost nearly as much she paid for entire house
EXCLUSIVE: Dua Lipa will be on stage this weekend in London, performing at Wembley Stadium to thousands of fans, but she has a long way to go to finish her home in the capital
Dua Lipa tonight kicks off her Wembley Stadium shows, and it appears like she could do the gig standing on her head, which she probably could.
In the hours leading up to her first of two shows at the London venue, the hugely successful singer posted photos showing her on stage preparing for the giant gigs and also a video of herself doing yoga posing upside down showing off her core strength.
Speaking earlier this month to Vogue, she said how much she loves performing live: 'Adrenaline is an incredible drug,' she explained 'I can hear people screaming before I'm even on. That's when my heart starts racing. Moments before, I'm like: 'Oh, my God, we're doing this.' And I'm ready to go.'
On playing Wembley, Dua also admitted: 'That's definitely been a massive dream, and it's going to be quite surreal. You know, stadiums: that seems pretty scary.'
Her overall aim is always to turn big spaces into little nightclubs, and her biggest fear is: 'as the rooms get bigger, how do you make them feel just as intimate?' Retaining that connection with an audience at Wembley, she admits, will be 'no easy task'.
But it was something she achieved at Glastonbury last year when she headlined the Pyramid stage and held a brightly coloured party for the crowd who loved up her performance.
Dua, 29, also found time close to her gigs to head to her Radical Optimism pop-up store she had created in Shoreditch around her hit album and these shows. Whilst there she could be seen chatting to fans, taking photos and creating her now famous drink 'Pickle And Jalapeño Diet Coke'.
It has been quite a few weeks for the singing star, who will go on to play two nights at Anfield Stadium in Liverpool on June 24 and 25 before heading to Dublin on June 27.
Last month she was named the most played artist across radio, TV and public places in the UK for a second time.And just a week ago she confirmed she is engaged to Callum Turner and they went public on the news with her admitting she is 'obsessed' with her new ring.
However, the couple - who began dating in January 2024 - have yet to set a wedding date because of their busy work schedules.
One thing that does seem certain, though, is that London will remain Dua Lipa's home for a long time to come. We can reveal that mega renovations at her London home are costing £6 million - nearly the same price as she paid for the house.
But it will take years to complete as workers using hand-held tools to appease posh neighbours and the local conservation group. While she's currently zipping around the world on tour, playing at Wembley tonight, work on the home she bought for £6.75M in March 2020 could take years to finish.
The property is undergoing a major transformation, but the construction team have to work at a snail's pace, using hand-held tools and machinery barely above the noise of a whisper.
It took the singer three years to win planning permission, finally in March 2024, for a ground floor extension and mega-basement with a music studio, pool, gym, cinema and chill out area.
But there were lots of rules attached to Camden Council's approval after her plans received complaints from the local conservation group, who were concerned about the 'loss of space', 'loss of trees' and 'drainage issues'. Her vast team of experts promised that noise would be kept to a minimum and all machinery and equipment be mounted with 'anti-vibration isolators'.
It'll be four times the size of the previous basement, at 310 square metres, she's having over 500 tonnes of soil excavated, and her team will have to dig at least six metres under the surface without affecting 17 historic trees surrounding the property and neighbouring properties as subsidence and flooding is a serious concern.
Her architects have agreed to a roof which will blend into the garden - 'a biodiverse roof garden blanket on a biodegradable carrier, providing food and habitat for the local wildlife'.
It's a huge job - and it may not be until 2027 until the star moves in. Property experts estimate the work costing as much £6million.
'It's within reason that she could be investing £3 million or more to make this a home that suits her needs, but you could also double that number depending on the level of bespoke customisation,' says Leigh Ann Raines from interior design firm Chic By Design.
Architect Tina Patel agrees that the price could easily be in excess of £6 million, including consultancy fees.'At a modest £3,000 per square metres for finishes you be looking at £2.4 million to fit out the property, so factoring in the build, we would anticipate costs to be in the region of £5 million although it is very much a case of how long is a piece of string as this could be exceeded with specialist items.
'On top of this, you would be looking at about 15-18% for consultants' fees. I would expect the build to take upwards of two years.' At least the money side of things seems unlikely to be too much of an issue for Dua. Accounting books from her Radical Live firm filed in July 2024 at Companies House showed she raked in an extraordinary £1 million a WEEK from 2023-2024 from her music, swelling her fortune to around £100m.
The star, 28, turned over an eye-watering £51.6m - up from £24.5m in 2022. And a healthy £21.8m was profit for Dua - a rise of £13m from the previous 12 months.
She hasn't looked back since her single Levitating was named the No1 song on the US charts of 2021. It was featured on her album Future Nostalgia, which was the best-selling new record of the year in the UK for 2020 and it hit number three in the States. She's also branched out into acting, including roles in Greta Gerwig's Barbie, which also contained her fourth UK Number 1 single, Dance The Night.
And then there are the seven Brit Awards and three Grammys. She was included on the Time 100 Next list in 2021. Her collaboration with Sir Elton John, Cold Heart, became her third No1 single here and her third studio album called 'Radical Optimism is now a year old but still loved by fans the world over. She has also had lucrative endorsement deals with Evian water and Yves Saint Laurent and is a Versace model.
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