What an oasis! Liam Gallagher's north London home stays green with grass intact despite record-breaking drought - but neighbours aren't as lucky

By ROBERT FOLKER, NEWS REPORTER Published: 16:54, 19 August 2026 | Updated: 16:59, 19 August 2026 Liam Gallagher has managed to keep his lawns green despite millions of gardens across the drought-hit country having turned brown in recent months - including his neighbours' grass. Aerial pictures show the land around the 53-year-old singer's £4million mock Tudor-style mansion, in Highgate, north London, is still extremely green. However, his neighbours haven't been as lucky, as their gardens have suffered in the summer's relentlessly hot and dry weather, leading to yellowing grass and scorched earth. Liam's property is supplied by Thames Water, which introduced a hosepipe ban on July 23 due to the weather conditions, which is still remaining active. Nine other water companies have brought in bans, which means customers are legally banned from using hosepipes to water gardens or wash cars, patios or boats. There is no evidence Liam has breached the ban, given there are many workarounds for watering grass such as using a watering can. He may also have an exemption.   Liam snapped up the property with fiancée Debbie Gwyther in 2020 after moving out of his former home, a £2.1million terrace, in Highgate - reportedly after quarrelling with neighbours. It comes as some areas in the country will have the 'first meaningful rain for a long time' this week, the Met Office said, after a summer of heatwaves and dry weather has left many areas facing water shortages. Aerial pictures show the land around Liam Gallagher's £4million mock Tudor-style mansion, in Highgate, North London, is still extremely green However, his neighbours haven't been as lucky, as their gardens have suffered in the summer's relentlessly hot and dry weather, leading to yellowing grass and scorched earth Liam's property is supplied by Thames Water, which introduced a hosepipe ban on July 23 due to the weather conditions, which is still remaining active. There is no evidence Liam has breached the ban Meanwhile, pictures emerged last week of the lush grounds around 81-year-old Sir Rod's Grade II-listed, 18th-century Essex mansion he bought for £4.65million in 2013. They remained a healthy green despite a series of record-breaking UK heatwaves - with the Met Office this week issuing 'amber alert' warnings.  However, there is no evidence that Sir Rod breached the hosepipe ban and he may have an exemption. Sir Rod's ten-bedroom home opens out onto a range of sprawling gardens and includes a mini golf course with a fairway, two bunkers and a lush putting green. There is also an artificial football pitch with a 20-space car park which Sir Rod had installed at the property before moving in with wife Penny Lancaster in 2016. Back in August 2006, Sir Rod risked a £1,000 fine when he was caught flouting the hosepipe ban at his previous £6million property Copped Hall, in Epping Forest. His spokesman said he was using an underground irrigation system, but Sir Rod's then-provider Three Valleys Water confirmed this was prohibited under the ban. Sir Rod later told the Mirror that November: 'This summer has caused a lot of trouble as it didn't rain for months. Every garden was burnt, every flower dried out. 'Water was rationed, watering was banned. Only my football pitch was a beautiful, lush green. Because, naturally, I continued to water it.' After being warned about a fine, Sir Rod said: 'I'll take that on board if it happens. For me there's hardly anything more beautiful than to walk across my tended grass.' Celebrity chef Jamie Oliver has also managed to keep his lawns greener than most thanks to a large private lake just a stone's throw from the back of his Essex mansion. The star has installed hosepipes between the pond and his garden, which is markedly greener than the parched countryside that surrounds it. Water taken from a privately owned source – such as from a lake, pond, spring or well on a property – is exempt from the hosepipe ban. Oliver has lived at the Grade I-listed 12-bedroom property since purchasing it for £6million in 2019, and the pond sits within its 70-acre site. Sir Rod Stewart’s Grade II-listed mansion has very green gardens despite the dry weather Sir Rod's mini golf course features a fairway, two bunkers and a lush putting green Chef Jamie Oliver's lawns are rather more green than most - helped by having a large personal lake just a stone's throw from the back of his Essex mansion England and Wales had their driest July ever recorded while southern England had its driest month ever, according to records going back almost 200 years.  And despite the 'first meaningful rain for a long time' this week,  it is 'not going to solve the drought situation overnight', a Met forecaster has said. They said the rainfall would not be a 'huge amount' and 'highly hit and miss from place to place', before conditions became drier again over the weekend. Met Office data showed up to 23mm of rain fell in parts of central southern Lancashire in the 12 hours to 6am on Wednesday, with up to 13mm recorded in parts of Northern Ireland and between 6-10mm across south-west England. In an online forecast, Met Office meteorologist Aidan McGivern said Wednesday would be a 'very showery day' across the UK, with Northern Ireland and areas in western and central Scotland seeing 'frequent showers with heavy downpours, hail and thunder'. The showers would be 'fewer and further between' in southern areas, while central England and eastern Wales could still see some downpours, the forecaster added. He said: 'I suspect many people across England and Wales will at least enjoy the feel of some rain falling out of the sky during the next few days, but it's not going to solve the drought situation overnight because we're not expecting huge amounts and it will be highly variable because a lot of it will come in the form of showers.' Wessex Water became the latest water company to impose a hosepipe ban on its 1.4 million customers across areas in Bath, Somerset, Dorset and Wiltshire on Tuesday. It is the first ban the company has put in place for 50 years, since the summer of 1976. Meanwhile, Thames Water has urged its customers to continue to reduce water usage as it said household demand has fallen by 3 per cent across London and more than 6 per cent across the Thames Valley and home counties since it introduced a hosepipe ban on July 23. In an update on Tuesday, the utility said London reservoir storage was at 74 per cent, which is lower than the firm would expect for this time of year but the Farmoor Reservoir in Oxfordshire was 92 per cent full. According to the company, rainfall in the Thames catchment area during July was less than 1mm, which is just 2 per cent of the long-term average, while customers used about 100 million litres more water every day than normal, putting more pressure on rivers, reservoirs and the water network. More than 27 million people across England have now had hosepipe use restricted in their area after months of hot and dry weather. The cooler and wetter conditions come after the UK's fifth heatwave of the summer, during which the hottest day of the year was recorded in Kew Gardens, London, on Thursday, when the temperature reached 38.1C.