The tiny Caribbean island of Mustique was made famous in the 1960s when its owner, Lord Glenconner, gave the Queen's late sister a 10 acre plot of land as a wedding present.
Lord Glenconner bought the island, which had been left to wrack and ruin following the decline of the great sugar plantations in the 19th Century, for £45,000 in 1958 .
In the early days, life on the island was simple: with little fresh water and dusty tracks for roads.
But the eccentric Scottish noble struck on the idea of parcelling up and selling off small pockets of land to carefully vetted buyers.
Princess Margaret commissioned theatrical designer, Oliver Messel, to build her a villa, Les Jolies Eaux. She adored Mustique because it was somewhere she could let her hair down away from prying eyes and public scrutiny.
Visitors included her cousin Lord Lichfield, who had a villa nearby, gangster John Bindon — with whom Princess Margaret is rumoured to have had an affair — and Mick Jagger. It was here, too, that she conducted her affair with Roddy Llewellyn, a landscape gardener 17 years her junior.
Princess Margaret gave Les Jolies Eaux to her son, Lord Linley, when he married in 1998, but, much to her distress, he quickly sold it.
In 1989 Mustique Island was transformed from a family estate into a private limited company - The Mustique Company - with the 100 or so homeowners as shareholders
There is no “out of season” as Mustique is far enough south to avoid hurricanes and enjoys temperatures of around 75F to 80F all year round.Read more: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/femail/article-2089525/Kate-Middleton-leaves-Prince-William-Anglesey-jets-Caribbean-family-holiday.html#ixzz1k3LLuNep
It is also one of the safest places in the Caribbean. The only murder in Mustique’s recent history occurred 10 years ago when a French heiress was found stabbed to death in her villa — a crime that has never been solved.
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