The new American ambassador to london Ambassador will be toast of town Millionaire married to drinks heiress is America’s new envoy ‘I explained to my son that Britain and the US are best friends’ Matthew Barzun, US Ambassador Not since Thomas Jefferson was in Paris hoovering up claret for his cellars back at Monticello has an American ambassador been so well set up for the important work of entertaining. Matthew Barzun, the latest US Ambassador to London, with his wife, Brooke. He will oversee the American embassy’s move to a new building, above Matthew Barzun, who was yesterday sworn in as the new US Ambassador to London, will head for his duties at the Court of St James’s with the best stocked drinks cabinet in diplomatic memory — for he is married to the heiress of the Jack Daniel’s whiskey empire. Brooke Barzun, an art curator and philanthropist, is heiress to the BrownForman company, which still has its headquarters in Louisville, Kentucky, and has a stable of brands, including Southern Comfort, Finlandia vodka and the Californian wines of SonomaCutrer. Her husband was sworn in by John Kerry, the Secretary of State, at a private ceremony in Washington DC. Mr Barzun, 42, previously served as US ambassador to Sweden, but he gave up the post to help with the Obama election campaign in 2011, reprising his work from first time around when he is credited with orchestrating the grassroots “citizen fundraiser” network. After graduating from Harvard, he worked at CNET, the media and tech company, and his knowledge of the web helped create the Obama donor network. At the last election he was responsible for bundling small donations totalling more than $2.3 million. In London, apart from working closely with the British Government on common issues, he will have to deal with 18,000 official visitors a year and more than 1,000 staff. He will live in the neo-Georgian splendour of Winfield House in Regent’s Park, and will preside over preparations for the move from the US Embassy’s heavily-defended Grosvenor Square address. The new embassy, which will be opened in 2017, is the key to the transformation of a stretch of the South Bank of the Thames at Nine Elms, from Battersea Power Station to Vauxhall. The US decided to move in 2008 as the UK’s property market slumped. They bought five acres of land from Ballymore, the Irish developer, and hired the US architects Kieran Timberlake to design a transparent, crystalline cube atop a colonnade, surrounded by a park featuring North American trees. The cost of the new embassy is about $1 billion before VAT. After a stand-off with the Treasury, the US is now expected to pay VAT on the construction. Giving evidence to a Senate committee last month, Mr Barzun said he would “work every day to nurture and deepen this special relationship”. He said that he would be deeply engaged in the debate about whether Britain should pull back from the European Union, making clear President Obama’s view that the American interest was best served by a “strong UK voice in a strong EU”. Ona lighter note, he said: “What Britain means to us can be summed up in many ways, but here’s one that came up in a conversation with our youngest son. When talking about the possibility of moving to London, I mentioned the fabled ‘special relationship.’ He asked me what that meant. My first attempts were long and failed. “Words like ‘allies’ didn‘t work. ‘Historic bilateral bonds’ was met with a blank stare. I thought for a while and then said, ‘We‘re best friends.’ That worked.” Ambassador Barzun is a descendant of the English Puritan lawyer John Winthrop, who led the first large group of migrants from England in 1630, founding the city of Boston. Winthrop was born in the Suffolk village of Groton and there is a stained glass window in St Bartholomew’s Church in his honour. At the Fox and Hounds in the village, a member of staff confirmed they have Jack Daniel’s and Southern Comfort behind the bar. Note to staff: he likes his bourbon straight up.
Posted on: Mon, 19 Aug 2013 15:07:59 +0000