Katrina Chandler revealed as not-so-mysterious buyer of Cate Blanchett's house

Katrina Chandler would be largely unknown to many Sydneysiders given she left Australia decades ago, but the daughter of Hunter Valley cattle farmer Ken Chandler is no stranger to many of London’s Notting Hill set.

Since settling in London in 2002 Katrina Chandler is known as Katrina Barter, the founder of The Grove Trust charity and wife of investment banker Chris Barter.

Thanks to her recent $18 million purchase in Hunters Hill, however, Sydneysiders have reason to know her as the buyer of the historic Bulwarra mansion sold by Hollywood star Cate Blanchett and Andrew Upton.

Despite this fact, Barter had likely hoped to keep the purchase under wraps given the strict confidentiality agreements signed by selling agent Ken Jacobs, of Christie’s International, and buyer’s agent Deborah West, of SydneySlice.

“Don’t bother trying to find out about this buyer because you won’t find anything,” was the only detail on the buyer offered by Ms West. Mr Jacobs was less forthcoming.

But few people, particularly among the world’s ultra-wealthy, are able to maintain such anonymity given the ubiquitous nature of the internet and the global reach of social media.

Add a defunct corporate interest registered in Ms Barter’s maiden name to the London home she shares with her husband, and there is little hope of keeping secret the purchase of one of Sydney’s most famous homes.

Chris Barter is a Harvard graduate who headed up Goldman Sachs’ Moscow office until 2012 when he left the bank to co-found technology investing advisory CKA Capital.

He is also a director of CNG Fuels, of which one of the founding directors is another Aussie export Baden Gowrie-Smith, son of wealthy businessman Ian Gowrie-Smith.

Ms Barter founded The Grove Trust in 2010 with her Notting Hill neighbours Julia Coupland and Dani Hains in a bid to “build meaningful relationships between residents and local charities”.

It remains unknown for how much longer the Barters plan to remain Notting Hill locals, however. Having bought the Blanchett home it is now for lease for about $8000 a week through SydneySlice Executive Rentals, although presumably Ms Barter plans a return home at some stage, even if just to visit her family.

Meanwhile, Cate Blanchett and Andrew Upton have joined the Barters in the UK where they bought a historic English manor in East Sussex in 2015 for £3 million.

The Barters were not the first buyers of Cate Blanchett’s home. Within weeks of hitting the market in 2015 with a $20 million guide it was sold to a buyer from China, who a year later was forced to default on the deal given problems getting their funds out of China.

Given the usual 10 per cent deposit on such deals, the failed deal would have represented a $1.98 million loss for the Chinese buyer.