Hugh Grosvenor; the Duke of Westminster and officially the richest person under 35 in the UK

He is now official the richest person in the UK under the age of 35 according to the Sunday Times Rich List in 2023 with an estimated fortune of £9.878 billion, but what he isn’t anymore is single - as Hugh Grosvenor, the 7th Duke of Westminster, is set to marry Olivia Henson, thus bringing an end to his status as the UK’s most eligible bachelor.

He met Miss Henson, an account manager at a food company, through friends and had been together for two years before Grosvenor popped the question at Eaton Hall in Cheshire, an 11,000-acre estate that has been the Grosvenor family home since the 15th century.

“The Duke of Westminster and Miss Olivia Henson are delighted to announce they are engaged to be married,” a spokesman for the Grosvenor family said in a statement on Sunday. “Members of both their families are absolutely delighted with the news.”

Counting the likes of Prince William and Harry, Duke of Sussex as some of his close friends, his relationship with the Prince of Wales has been so close that he became the godfather of Prince George after his arrival in 2013, Grosvenor inherited the title Duke of Westminster after the death of his father, Gerald Grosvenor, 6th Duke of Westminster, in 2016. 

The wealth that Grosvenor inherited comes from the vast real estate empire that has passed through generations of his family, including a number of properties in the esteemed Belgravia area of London, alongside a vast portfolio of high-end, prime real estate in the capital. Unsurprisingly, that has led to the Grosvenor family to frequently be referred to as one of the most successful families in British business, and for a short time meant Hugh was one of the youngest billionaires in the world upon receiving his inheritance.

Having studied at the illustrious Ludgrove School, a prestigious preparatory school in Berkshire, England where Prince William and Harry also attended (albeit two years ahead of Grosvenor), the future Duke of Westminster then attended Ellesmere College in Shropshire before studying countryside management at Newcastle University. But rather than walking into a role in his family’s real estate business, he instead cut his teeth as a countryside surveyor for a firm called Smiths Gore, which specialises in land management and rural property services.

However, by 2013 Grosvenor finally joined the family business after working for Smiths Gore for a year.  He started as a project manager in the estate's rural team and was responsible for managing a portfolio of properties in the north of England. He then moved to the London office of the Grosvenor Group, where he worked in various roles across different business areas, including the development and asset management teams, before assuming more leadership roles after the death of his father and inheritance of the Duke of Westminster title.

Although a very private individual, seldom giving interviews and preferring intimate surroundings than being in public settings, Grosvenor has made a name for himself for his philanthropic efforts as much as his former status as an eligible bachelor. He is the patron of several organisations, including the Royal National Lifeboat Institution, the Cystic Fibrosis Trust, and the Defence and National Rehabilitation Centre - donating millions each year to these charities, taking a leaf out of the philanthropic efforts of Prince William and Harry respectively.