London Daily

Focus on the big picture.
Tuesday, Oct 07, 2025

Luxury flat owners lose privacy appeal against Tate Modern viewpoint

Court dismisses latest attempt to stop gallery visitors looking into glass-walled apartments

Residents of flats overlooked by the Tate Modern have lost the latest round of their legal battle with the gallery at the court of appeal.

The owners of four flats in the Neo Bankside development on London’s South Bank took legal action in an attempt to stop “hundreds of thousands of visitors” looking into their homes from the Tate’s viewing platform.

They applied for an injunction requiring the gallery to prevent members of the public observing their flats by cordoning off parts of the platform or erecting screening, to stop what they said was a “relentless” invasion of their privacy.

But the Tate Gallery board of trustees argued that the platform provided “a unique, free, 360° view of London”, and said the claimants could simply draw the blinds. In a ruling last February, the high court accepted that “the complete glass walls of the living accommodation” gave visitors to the viewing gallery a “complete (or largely complete) view” into the flats.

Mr Justice Mann dismissed the claim, and suggested the owners could lower their solar blinds or install privacy film or net curtains.

The judge added: “These properties are impressive, and no doubt there are great advantages to be enjoyed in such extensive glassed views, but that in effect comes at a price in terms of privacy.”

In a ruling on Wednesday, the court of appeal dismissed the owners’ challenge to that ruling.

Announcing the court’s decision, the master of the rolls, Sir Terence Etherton, said: “The court has dismissed the appeal on the basis that overlooking does not fall within the tort of nuisance.”

The judge added the flat owners’ application for permission to appeal to the supreme court had been refused. In a statement after the ruling, Natasha Rees, head of property litigation at Forsters, who acted for the five residents, said her clients were considering a further application to the supreme court.

She added: “The leaseholders are obviously very disappointed with the outcome of the appeal, not least because they lost on a ground raised by the court of appeal.

“This is not a case of ‘mere overlooking’ but a situation that can clearly be distinguished from the type of overlooking experienced between residential or commercial flats and houses, a fact that was accepted by the first instance judge.”

A Tate spokeswoman said in a statement: “We have noted the decision of the court of appeal and are grateful for their careful consideration of this matter. We continue to be mindful of the amenity of our neighbours and the role of Tate Modern in the local community.”

In its judgment, the court of appeal ruled: “Despite the hundreds of years in which there has been a remedy for causing nuisance to an adjoining owner’s land and the prevalence of overlooking in all cities and towns, there has been no reported case in this country in which a claimant has been successful in a nuisance claim for overlooking by a neighbour.”

It added that “what is really the issue in cases of overlooking in general, and the present case in particular, is invasion of privacy rather than … damage to interests in property”.

The court found “there are already other laws which bear on privacy”, such as the Data Protection Act or the Protection from Harassment Act, adding: “It would be preferable to leave it to parliament to formulate any further laws that are perceived to be necessary to deal with overlooking rather than to extend the law of private nuisance.”

At a high court hearing in November 2018, Tom Weekes QC said the Tate was “operating a public viewing platform so as to encourage (hundreds of thousands of) visitors” to look into his clients’ homes.

In a witness statement for that hearing, one of the claimants, Lindsay Urquhart, said: “I feel as though my life revolves around the viewing platform’s opening hours.”

Another claimant, Ian McFadyen, said: “When our blinds are open and the viewing platform is in use, we are more or less constantly watched, waved at, photographed and filmed by people on the viewing platform.”

But Guy Fetherstonhaugh QC, for the Tate, said “the claimants’ remedy for what they perceive to be a nuisance lies in their own hands”, adding: “There is no right to a view.”

He said the claimants were seeking “to force the defendant to close a valued resource, and deny to the public the right to use the viewing platform for its intended purpose, merely to give the claimants an unencumbered right to enjoy their own view”.

Newsletter

Related Articles

0:00
0:00
Close
Three Scientists Awarded Nobel Prize in Medicine for Discovery of Immune Self-Tolerance Mechanism
OpenAI and AMD Forge Landmark AI-Chip Alliance with Equity Option
Munich Airport Reopens After Second Drone Shutdown
France Names New Government Amid Political Crisis
Trump Stands Firm in Shutdown Showdown and Declares War on Drug Cartels — Turning Crisis into Opportunity
Surge of U.S. Billionaires Transforms London’s Peninsula Apartments into Ultra-Luxury Stronghold
Pro Europe and Anti-War Babiš Poised to Return to Power After Czech Parliamentary Vote
Jeff Bezos Calls AI Surge a ‘Good’ Bubble, Urges Focus on Lasting Innovation
Japan’s Ruling Party Chooses Sanae Takaichi, Clearing Path to First Female Prime Minister
Sean ‘Diddy’ Combs Sentenced to Fifty Months in Prison Following Prostitution Conviction
Taylor Swift’s ‘Showgirl’ Launch Extends Billion-Dollar Empire
Trump Administration Launches “TrumpRx” Plan to Enable Direct Drug Sales at Deep Discounts
Trump Announces Intention to Impose 100 Percent Tariff on Foreign-Made Films
Altman Says GPT-5 Already Outpaces Him, Warns AI Could Automate 40% of Work
Singapore and Hong Kong Vie to Dominate Asia’s Rising Gold Trade
Trump Organization Teams with Saudi Developer on $1 Billion Trump Plaza in Jeddah
Manhattan Sees Surge in Office-to-Housing Conversions, Highest Since 2008
Switzerland and U.S. Issue Joint Assurance Against Currency Manipulation
Electronic Arts to Be Taken Private in Historic $55 Billion Buyout
Thomas Jacob Sanford Named as Suspect in Deadly Michigan Church Shooting and Arson
Russian Research Vessel 'Yantar' Tracked Mapping Europe’s Subsea Cables, Raising Security Alarms
New York Man Arrested After On-Air Confession to 2017 Parents’ Murders
U.S. Defense Chief Orders Sudden Summit of Hundreds of Generals and Admirals
Global Cruise Industry Posts Dramatic Comeback with 34.6 Million Passengers in 2024
Trump Claims FBI Planted 274 Agents at Capitol Riot, Citing Unverified Reports
India: Internet Suspended in Bareilly Amid Communal Clashes Between Muslims and Hindus
Supreme Court Extends Freeze on Nearly $5 Billion in U.S. Foreign Aid at Trump’s Request
Archaeologists Recover Statues and Temples from 2,000-Year-Old Sunken City off Alexandria
China Deploys 2,000 Workers to Spain to Build Major EV Battery Factory, Raising European Dependence
Speed Takes Over: How Drive-Through Coffee Chains Are Rewriting U.S. Coffee Culture
U.S. Demands Brussels Scrutinize Digital Rules to Prevent Bias Against American Tech
Ringo Starr Champions Enduring Beatles Legacy While Debuting Las Vegas Art Show
Private Equity’s Fundraising Surge Triggers Concern of European Market Shake-Out
Colombian President Petro Vows to Mobilize Volunteers for Gaza and Joins List of Fighters
FBI Removes Agents Who Kneeled at 2020 Protest, Citing Breach of Professional Conduct
Trump Alleges ‘Triple Sabotage’ at United Nations After Escalator and Teleprompter Failures
Shock in France: 5 Years in Prison for Former President Nicolas Sarkozy
Tokyo’s Jimbōchō Named World’s Coolest Neighbourhood for 2025
European Officials Fear Trump May Shift Blame for Ukraine War onto EU
BNP Paribas Abandons Ban on 'Controversial Weapons' Financing Amid Europe’s Defence Push
Typhoon Ragasa Leaves Trail of Destruction Across East Asia Before Making Landfall in China
The Personality Rights Challenge in India’s AI Era
Big Banks Rebuild in Hong Kong as Deal Volume Surges
Italy Considers Freezing Retirement Age at 67 to Avert Scheduled Hike
Italian City to Impose Tax on Visiting Dogs Starting in 2026
Arnault Denounces Proposed Wealth Tax as Threat to French Economy
Study Finds No Safe Level of Alcohol for Dementia Risk
Denmark Investigates Drone Incursion, Does Not Rule Out Russian Involvement
Lilly CEO Warns UK Is ‘Worst Country in Europe’ for Drug Prices, Pulls Back Investment
Nigel Farage Emerges as Central Force in British Politics with Reform UK Surge
×