The hackneyed adage “money can’t buy taste” comes to mind. Some of Sandbanks’ new-builds, alas, look like they were designed by AI. I pop into local firm TRA Architects to find out what’s going on.  

“AI would probably have done a better job,” agrees architect Tom Reynolds, who had nothing to do with the properties in question. Still, Reynolds, a Kiwi, “loves it here. It was between Poole Harbour and New Zealand, and I chose Poole,” he says. “The biodiversity is wonderful, particularly the birdlife,” he adds. 

“We had Springwatch down here,” coos Julie Halford, who works for a luxury cashmere brand, but shares an office with TRA. “I love being here,” she agrees. “It’s brilliant – the beaches, that after-work swim. And there’s a really nice community.” However, there are a lot of Airbnbs, she admits, and people driving around in “small willy” cars. 

Speaking of cars, I find myself eyeing up an eighties Merc outside the neighbouring garage. It’s a reminder that the oldies really are the best. (Why did we stop making fun cars?) Another relic endures further along the road in the form of a period cottage, which stands resolute against creeping modernism; a hold out, like Brownsea’s red squirrels. Old money.  

I stop for food, not at Rick Stein’s restaurant (the celebrity chef is reportedly a Sandbanks resident), but at CAFF, a reassuringly unpretentious joint serving all-day breakfasts. “People are pretty down to Earth here,” the waitress tells me, as I order some chips.

Waiting for my lunch, I watch wet-suited kite surfers come in from the harbour, and white van men whizz by towards the next home renovation. In the car park opposite, near the mini-golf course, I see a “self-service dog wash machine” where pampered pooches can be hosed down after a day at the beach. Because nobody wants sand in the Range Rover now, do they.