Laurence Llewelyn-Bowen: I turned down £500,000 to front a TV ad campaign, it sounded rather boring

Laurence Llewelyn-Bowen is best known as a television presenter on hit home improvement show Changing Rooms from 1996-2004.

The flamboyant 61-year-old has since appeared in everything from The Weakest Link to Interior Design Masters. He and his wife Jackie live in a manor house in the Cotswolds with their two daughters, sons-in-law and four grandchildren.

What did your parents teach you about money?

My father was an orthopaedic surgeon in Harley Street and my mother was a teacher but got multiple sclerosis.

I’m sure we must have struggled moneywise after my dad died of leukaemia, aged 42, but my mum tried hard not to make that apparent.

My siblings and I still received a few farthings a week pocket money, and my clothing allowance was £30 a week (in today’s money) when I was a teenager.

I was a bit of a New Romantic but never went so far as getting a beret.

Laurence Llewelyn-Bowen, right, was a BBC star in Changing Rooms in the early 2000s

Have you ever struggled to make ends meet?

I’ve always struggled to make ends meet, and now I’ve reached my 60s I’ve noticed that the money-tree bears less and less fruit.

My younger daughter, Hermione, now the managing director of my company, is regularly putting me on a money diet and telling me I can’t do this and can’t do that – she’s the queen of my universe. Having said that, I’m more careful now with my money than when I was younger and constantly buying books, clothes and fags.

I was getting through a pack a day at one point, but I quit smoking 25 years ago – that has saved me a fortune.

Have you ever been paid silly money?

A lot of people will think I get pretty well paid for what I do, but I don’t regard what I got for presenting Changing Rooms, for instance, as silly money.

I’ve certainly never been offered ridiculous money to appear at someone’s wedding, or something like that.

I could have made much more money if I’d been an out and out media whore, but I’m a ‘media whore lite!’

What was the best year of your financial life?

My income has been reasonably consistent over the past 30 years, but the 1990s and 2000s, when I was the ‘new dandy on the block’, so to speak, were particularly good.

I’m grateful that the public, by and large, still seem to like me after all these years in the spotlight – though I’m fully aware of how Marmite I am. I’ve never wanted to be popular with everybody, though.

I think a lot of people think of me as a high street Joan Collins!

 Laurence Llewelyn-Bowen is well-known for his flamboyant style

The most expensive thing you bought for fun?

When I lived in London, I used to do some quite serious damage in Greenwich Market after getting through a couple of bottles of wine at lunchtime.

But the only pricey things I buy for fun these days are clothes and shoes.

My three-piece suits, made by my tailor, cost about £1,200, but I’m still wearing some of them ten years later.

Similarly, my Jeffery-West boots cost about £600, but they are made to last.

What was your biggest money mistake?

Every now and then I wonder if I did the right thing when, at the height of Changing Rooms’ popularity, I turned down a near £500,000 offer to front a TV ad campaign for an electrical firm.

But I just thought it sounded rather boring – indeed, when it aired it was pilloried for being a magnificently dull campaign. I’ve also turned down the odd TV programme I felt was unnourishing.

Best money decision you have made?

Setting up my own product design company. I’ve worked with a lot of retail chains, which sell my branded products, be it rugs or kitchens. That’s the real engine room of my finances.

 A mission to bring colour and excitement to people's homes made Llewelyn-Bowen's name

Will you pass down your money or spend it all?

When I read about celebrities putting their children in steerage while they fly business class, so as not to pamper them, I think ‘Oh, really!’

I think parents are duty-bound to help their children, though I’ve never wanted to fill a swimming pool with gold coins and shower them on my family.

That said, I think it’s wrong to criticise someone for being a ‘nepo baby’ because they’ve got a famous parent. Having grown up with my business, my two daughters are perfectly placed to push my brand; Hermione is the managing director of it and Cecile runs our emporium in Cirencester [in Gloucestershire].

Do you have a pension?

I paid into one for a number of years but it didn’t do spectacularly well – and besides, having a ‘ploddington pension’ in the background is not where I am right now.

So I’ve cashed it in to pay for a few home improvements and I’d like to do something interesting investment-wise with the rest. I don’t plan to retire for a while yet.

Do you own any property?

I live in a 17th century manor house on the outskirts of Cirencester, which cost about £1.2 million 20 years ago. It’s more than doubled in value since.

We’ve subdivided it so that Jackie and I have a two-bedroom flat, which suits our needs, while our daughters and their families live elsewhere in the house.

Having an old home you have to accept that there’s always going to be a damp patch somewhere and a couple of loose slates.

If you were Chancellor what would you do?

I’m a pretty apolitical person but I know that my sons-in-law have been incredibly hard hit by the VAT put on school fees. It’s led them to question whether they shouldn’t put their kids in a local school – no bad thing.

If I was Chancellor I know I’d have a solid gin when I got home.

What is your number one financial priority?

Just to make sure my wife has enough gin to keep her from kicking me out.

Laurence has partnered with Smart Energy GB. For more information about using smart meters in your home, visit: smartenergygb.org