mansion

LUCY Mecklenburgh & Ryan Thomas have put their Cheshire mansion on the market for £1.25million.

But former Towie star and Coronation Street actor may not see a penny after his money woes were revealed.

Ryan, 42, has previously spoke about his financial difficulties after he was declared bankrupt in 2013 over an unpaid £40,000 tax bill.

The soap star first purchased the Edwardian property near Stockport for just £675,000 in 2021.

But just five years on and the sprawling mansion has nearly doubled in value.

They have spent thousands of pounds renovating the property and have modernised the kitchen, living room, bedrooms.

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The property also boasts a walk-in wardrobe, Pilates room and a stunning outdoor patio.

The Sun have reached out to reps for comment.

Last October, The Sun revealed that Ryan was down to his last £1 in his company’s bank account.

The actor runs a media firm called R James Thomas Ltd which takes in cash from his TV and endorsement work.

Annual accounts filed to Companies House showed just a solitary pound in the company account for the 12 months to the end of January last year.

His cash balance was £41,361 in the previous 12 months.

With assets taken into account, the firm had a bottom line of £28,275 when the books were filed to Companies House.

A Corporation Tax bill of £55,062 reveals he still enjoyed a profitable year.

Meanwhile, the books also revealed at the time that he had more than £30,000 of a Covid Bounce Back Loan still to pay.

Ryab teamed up with Waterloo Road star younger brother Adam for ITV game show 99 To Beat.

The show launched last March but by August, it was axed after just one series.

Despite his TV successes, the star previously confessed he has struggled managing his finances.

He found fame at just 16, earning £100,000 – but he said he lacked a financial role model growing up.

Ryan said: “I had money from a very young age – and for a 16-year-old I had a hell of a lot of money.

“So, I did have a credit card growing up and it caused me a few problems.

“It’s so long ago I can’t remember how much I took my eye off the ball, but I know that I was always late paying it back and it became a debt that I never knew existed.”

Young Ryan would also foot the bill for nights out with his friends which meant he would spend more than he should.

In addition, Ryan revealed he filed for bankruptcy in 2013 due to an unpaid tax bill, which he said was down to him being careless.

The dad – who is engaged to former TOWIE star Lucy  – said: “But I don’t regret any of the things that happened to me because I actually feel like they’ve been a real blessing.

“I’ve learnt so much and I don’t think to myself ‘oh, I did this, I did that’ because I’m the sort of guy who takes a day at a time anyway.

“I don’t really think about too much into the future and during that time I was earning anyway, so it wasn’t like I was jobless.

“I just lost everything and started again.”

After leaving the cobbles, he won Celebrity Big Brother in 2018 and made a guest appearance in Neighbours.

Ryan later appeared on Celebrity MasterChef and Celebrity Antiques Road Trip in 2022 and went on to win last year’s Dancing on Ice.

ALONGSIDE his brother Noel, Oasis rocker Liam Gallagher is believed to have earned around £50million from their Live ‘25 Tour.

But rather than spending it on VIP boxes at Manchester City, or a palatial palace and gold-plated bone for his beloved rescue dog Buttons, Liam appears to have plunged part of his cash into a new house.

Paperwork for his pad in the Cotswolds, which he bought with fiancée Debbie Gwyther, revealed the singer paid the £4million bill in cash.

A source said: “Liam and Noel are both savvy and have ­people advising them when it comes to their earnings.

“The cash they earned from their Live ’25 Tour is just the start of it as, when they finish their second tour next year, they will both be so minted they’d never have to work a day in their lives ever again.”

And as they continue to ride the wave of success — with their 42-date tour next year totally sold out — Noel and Liam are doing everything they can to ­protect their ­legacy.

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Yesterday it was ­confirmed the brothers had taken legal action against an auction house over a proposed sale of old Oasis recordings.

London-based Littleton ­Auctions had announced they had a huge lot of archive ­footage — including audio from soundchecks and 100 hours of rehearsal tapes from Oasis’s Nineties heyday.

The lot was taken to them by Owain Richards, whose father Huw worked with the band from 1994 until 2001.

An injunction has now been taken out by Oasis to stop the ­auction going ahead.

The MD of the company said in a statement: “Littleton Auctions confirms that the Oasis recordings known as The Desk Tapes have been ­withdrawn from our October 3 auction in light of legal ­proceedings.

“We are very ­disappointed that we cannot offer this ­significant archive as planned.”

When asked about the legal row, Owain said: “It is true that Oasis have sued me and my father, to try to prevent the auction of the tapes made by my father many years ago.

“We have agreed to postpone the auction to enable the legal dispute to be resolved, either by litigation or otherwise in an orderly way.”

Some items have been allowed through, including original set lists and itineraries from Oasis’s early tours, as well as an original Kangol parka coat, and will go under the hammer on ­Saturday.

JIMI STILL IN RON’S ART

RONNIE WOOD has put his never-before-seen portraits of Jimi Hendrix on display at the late rocker’s home, which has been turned into a museum in London.

Speaking at Handel Hendrix House, where he was given a giant celebratory bouquet of flowers, Ronnie also spilled the beans about the time when he and Jimi were young housemates in London back in the day.

He revealed they both nearly starved because neither of them had a clue how to cook.

Ronnie said: “Food was never an option.

“We had a few peas to shove around the plate.”

But life was certainly interesting.

Ronnie said of Jimi: “He could play the guitar right and left-handed.

“He used to play over the neck, upside down.

“In the end, he ran out of ideas and used to set his guitar on fire.”

Recalling Jimi’s passing in 1970, Ronnie added: “I was at Ronnie Scott’s the night he died.

“He was walking away with his arm around a girl, he said goodbye – and died that night.

“It was such a shock the next day.”

Ronnie also gave an update on The Rolling Stones after their last two planned tours were canned.

He said: “I take it as it comes.

“I don’t like waiting.

“That is why I get a band together, to keep playing.”

You can get along now to Ronnie’s show at Jimi’s old house in Mayfair, which was also once home to composer George Frideric Handel.

It runs until April 11 next year.

BIG NAMES LINE UP FOR MERCURY SHOW

FLORENCE + THE MACHINE, Olivia Dean, Raye, Suede, Pulp and Jade Thirlwall are all confirmed as performers at this year’s Mercury Prize show.

Dove Ellie, Knats, Kojey Radical and Nia Archvies will also take to the stage at the Utilita Arena in Newcastle on October 22.

Each artist will perform one track from their Album Of The Year entry, while fellow nominees Dave and Sir Paul McCartney will be celebrated with two special, short films showcasing their records.

THE BEATLES’ Apple Corps company made a huge £41.1million profit last year.

That’s up £16million on the year before, with surviving members Paul McCartney and Ringo Starr each pocketing millions, as will the estates of John Lennon and George Harrison.

JUST A PERFECT DAZE

DAISY EDGAR-JONES reminds me here of an angelic ornament you’d find in your nan’s garden.

She wore this demure white dress for a garden shoot in Australia to promote her movie Sense And Sensibility, based on the romantic novel by Jane Austen.

As is the trend with actresses now, Daisy has taken a leaf out of Zendaya‘s book and is matching her fashion choices to the film she’s promoting.

And as she steps back in time to play sensible older sister Elinor Dashwood in the new big-screen adaptation of Austen’s 1811 novel, Daisy absolutely nailed the vibe while posing for pictures in Sydney.

But could her stylist have a bit more fun with her fashion? For sure.

BRIT Awards bosses say ­holding the ceremony in ­Manchester for the first time gave the city a major boost ­earlier this year.

A new report says the ceremony contributed £5million in direct spending, with £3.6million coming from visitors and the remaining £1.4million from organisers and ­partners.

On top of this, employment rates got a helping hand, with 3,099 temporary jobs created.

The report also revealed that 92 per cent of attendees rated their Brits experience as excellent or good – which is helpful, given the bash is going to be held at Co-op Live in the city for the next two years.

Stacey Tang, co-president of RCA Records at Sony Music UK and chair of the Brits Committee, said: ­“Moving the Brits to ­Manchester was about more than moving an awards show.

“It’s about shining a light on ­talent and creative communities across the UK, opening up opportunities and widening participation.”

R.E.M. are re- releasing their 12th studio album Reveal to celebrate its 25th anniversary.

The reissue – out November 20 – will be put out alongside The Black Sessions Revealed, a previously unreleased 17-song performance by R.E.M., recorded for Radio France in 2001.

THE house where ­Taylor Swift recorded her 2014 No1 album 1989 has gone up for sale.

The Pillsbury Estate in Beverly Hills, which was her home for seven years until 2018, has become a mecca for fans.

It is now on the market for $7.9million.

GRAND PLANS

FREDDIE Mercury’s grand piano is going under the hammer today – and could fetch up to £400,000.

Before the auction began, the late Queen frontman’s godson, Freddie Mack, opened up about his favourite memories of his namesake.

In an exclusive chat, he said: “He came to my family home in Munich, and there was this big rocking horse.

“It was very fancy and I was kind of scared of it.

“He just waited with me then guided me to befriend this new toy.

“He put me on it and rocked me back on forth and showed me that this is a nice gift, nothing to be scared of.

“He just took his time to be there for me.”

The piano is up for sale at Propstore’s Music Memorabilia auction, alongside other big-ticket collectors’ pieces.

These include Michael Jackson‘s black and gold military-style jacket, which could fetch up to £500,000.

Or if you fancy John Lennon’s tinted glasses, they could cost you £200,000.

STACEY Solomon has explained why all of her sons are sleeping in the same room at her new £2million mansion – after it was revealed that she is the sole owner of the property. 

Yesterday The Sun told how Stacey, 36, bought the sprawling Essex home without the help of partner Joe Swash. 

The Sort Your Life Out host – mum to Zachary, 18, Leighton, 14, Rex, seven, Rose, four, and three-year-old Belle – has been keeping fans up-to-date on her makeover plans for the house.

In a new clip shared on social media Stacey shared how renovations mean the boys are currently packed into the same bedroom. 

She said: “All the boys are sleeping in one room because they don’t have bedrooms yet because we’re working on the upstairs.  

“They’re all sleeping in one room downstairs, it’s like The Brady Bunch when they go to bed.” 

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Stacey and Joe stunned fans earlier this month when they packed up their dream home Pickle Cottage – which she bought alone in 2021 for £1.3million – and moved to the new property. 

On Thursday The Sun revealed how the former Loose Women panelist purchased it without the help of Joe, 44.

A well-placed insider told us: “Stacey’s a canny businesswoman and was also the sole owner of Pickle Cottage, which sold for over £1million, so it made sense she’d buy the new home on her own.

“She even got some money knocked off the official asking price.

“Stacey paid over £2m for the new Essex mansion – but she’s worth over £10m so that’s not even a dent in her bank balance.”

Earlier this year The Sun told how Stacey – who it was previously revealed is not legally married to former EastEnders star Joe despite a lavish wedding at Pickle Cottage – had hit the £10million mark in her business empire.

It was 1963 and up-and-coming freelance journalist Gloria Steinem had been a working writer in New York City for roughly three years when Show magazine sent her on an undercover assignment that she was uniquely qualified for: to infiltrate Manhattan’s “greatest new showbiz gimmick,” the Playboy Club. She already had the beauty and brains, all she’d need was an alias, a leotard and a notebook. The assignment would change the course of her career, but not in the way that she’d hoped.

“GIRLS:

Do Playboy Club Bunnies Really

Have Glamorous Jobs,

Meet Celebrities, And

Make Top Money?

Yes, it’s true! Attractive young girls can now earn $200-$300 a week at the fabulous New York Playboy Club, enjoy the glamorous and exciting aura of show business, and have the opportunity to travel to other Playboy Clubs throughout the world.”

Armed with the above ad and welcomed by a grinning private guard calling, “Here bunny, bunny, bunny!” Steinem set out to expose the working conditions and interior lives of the bunnies slinging booze to the playboys who patronized the club. She subjected herself to the wardrobe fittings, which included getting her bunny suit stuffed to boost her breast size; she was poked and prodded during an invasive physical exam; she strutted through the club near-naked with sore feet and a suit so tight, she had to wrap gauze around her midsection where her skin had been rubbed raw; and various other indignities she underwent for the sake of journalism.

Documenting a lunch shift at the club, Steinem wrote, “Somehow, the usual tail pullings and propositions and pinching and ogling seemed all the more depressing when, outside this windowless room of perpetual night, the sun was shining.”

Steinem’s article accomplished what it set out to do, and not only were the working conditions at the club exposed, but some were subsequently improved because of her work. In her essay collection “Outrageous Acts and Everyday Rebellions,” Steinem wrote that in response to the story, Hugh Hefner wrote her a letter saying that her “beef about the physical given [to] the girls before they start work at the club prompted my eliminating it.”

Also as a result of her piece, she was slapped with a $1-million libel suit, subpoenaed as a witness in a liquor laws case against the Playboy Club, and received “obscene and threatening” calls.

Most notable, of the short-term results of the story, was the immediate impact it had on her career. Sure, in a lot of ways it had put her on the map, but she struggled to land serious journalistic assignments because, as she put it, “I had now become a Bunny — and it didn’t matter why.”

Steinem, a feminist icon and one of the most widely recognized leaders of the second-wave women’s movement, died on Wednesday at 92. Since she shed the bunny suit after her 11-day stint on the job at the Playboy Club, she went on to cofound New York Magazine and Ms. Magazine, which changed the course of the abortion rights movement with its “We Have Had Abortions” petition in which high-profile women admitted to having illegal abortions, Steinem among them. She played a pivotal role in spearheading some of the most influential and successful women’s rights efforts. And in 2013, she was awarded the Presidential Medal of Freedom for her lifetime of work as a journalist and activist.

Still, with all the aforementioned accomplishments, and decades later, Steinem said that her naysayers used her bunny work in an attempt to discredit her. For decades she considered the story a “professional error of gigantic proportions.” But later, she changed her tune.

“I’m not sorry I did it,” she told Ronan Farrow in 2020, when she was 86 years old. “But it is true that as old as I am, when anybody wants to put me down, they say, ‘Well, she was once a bunny.’ ”

In Steinem’s “Famous Last Words” interview, released on Netflix following her death, she closed the segment by addressing the audience. “Please tell your own story,” she said. “This is the most important thing we can do for each other: is to know each other through stories.”

I was hesitant to tell this story, and stewed over the potential risks I would be taking by telling it, but then I thought of the risk Steinem took. She dealt with fallout and she grappled with the ways the article may have hurt her career more than helped. But of the ample wisdom she imparted, its the power of women’s stories to shift culture, change policy and empower other women that feels most resonant.

I didn’t discover Steinem’s “I Was a Playboy Bunny” exposé until I was in college. I was in my late twenties at the time because I’d taken a few detours after I left high school, most of them dead ends.

One such detour led me through the massive hedge-lined gates of the Playboy Mansion. I was 18, and the E! reality series “The Girls Next Door” sparked renewed interest in Playboy bunnies. I wish I could say that I’d arrived at the mansion on an undercover magazine assignment, but the reality was different. I’d been watching a rerun of the E! show from a bedbug-ridden townhome in downtown Los Angeles, and earlier that day I grappled with whether I should pay my parking debt or buy a burrito.

I watched as the girls bounced around the mansion, appearing carefree, bedbug-free and parking ticket-free. Their lives, produced and edited as they were, appeared to be stable and glamorous, and I thought, “Hmm, maybe I should do that.” If Hefner was good at anything, it was creating a facade.

Like Steinem found, applying to be a Playboy bunny was surprisingly simple. I emailed a photo of myself in a swimsuit and shortly afterward, an invitation to a casting call at the mansion arrived.

At the casting call, I was handed a satin robe and pointed toward a small tent where I could change and a large tent with the photo crew inside. Steinem had likened wearing the bunny suit to feeling like meat on a hook. I, too, couldn’t shake the thought of a meat factory and almost instantly, realized I wanted off the conveyor belt.

My trip to the mansion and endeavor to become a bunny was short-lived. I’d driven there feeling like a femme fatale, and left feeling naive and out of my depth. Worse, it was just another humiliating misadventure that I’d carry around for years with shame.

That is until I came across her story in her essay collection “Outrageous Acts and Everyday Rebellions.”

Steinem said that she was pigeonholed because of the story. She struggled afterward to be taken seriously and that may be true, but I’d argue an opposite point. Because Steinem was ultimately held in such high regard as a journalist and activist, and because she was an undercover bunny along the way, she helped the bunnies of the world to take themselves a little more seriously, to see that beyond the bunny suit, there is a world of possibilities waiting for them.

In the collection, originally published in 1983 and reprinted several times, Steinem wrote that after a town-hall meeting in New Bedford, Mass., a little girl of 6 or 7 gave her a crayon drawing of her in the bunny costume copied from a photo that had circulated online. “ ‘Even if a girl looks silly,’ she said, ‘boys should know that’s she’s smart.’ ”

“This story may outlast me,” she wrote. “but it’s not going to outlast or outsmart that little girl.”

In the book, Steinem wrote that one longer-term result of the article was “realizing that all women are Bunnies. After feminism arrived in my life, I stopped regretting that I had written the article.”

The line “All women are Bunnies” stands out. But what I imagine she meant is, bunnies are just women.