JESSICA SALTER

The house where JM Barrie is believed to have written the children's story Peter Pan was up for sale yesterday for £6.75m.

The six-bedroom Victorian property in central London is opposite Kensington Gardens, where James Matthew Barrie met five boys who inspired his creation.

The 3377 sq ft house on Gloucester Road includes two large living and entertaining rooms with original period features, study, dining room, kitchen and private garden. There are also six bedrooms and two balconies.

Will Pitt, manager of Foxtons in South Kensington, said: "The house really has caused quite a stir in the market and, although it is unique and an incredible opportunity regardless of background, the history really does add an extra dimension.

"Who wouldn't like to stand in the nursery of Peter Pan? The current owners fell in love with the period features."

Barrie published his first story about Peter Pan in 1902 in a book called The Little White Bird. In the story, Peter Pan flies out of his nursery and lands in the park.

Two years later, Barrie wrote another Peter Pan adventure with the Tinkerbell and Captain Hook characters which became a successful play and later novel.

Barrie was married to Mary, but they had no children of their own. In 1909 Mary had an affair with another writer and their marriage ended.

Barrie formed a friendship with Sylvia Llewelyn Davies, the daughter of novelist George du Maurier, and her sons. Peter Pan evolved from stories that Barrie told the five young Llewelyn Davies boys - "the lost boys".

In a dedication to the boys at the beginning of the original Peter Pan play, Barrie wrote: "I suppose I always knew I made Peter by rubbing the five of you violently together, as savages with two sticks produce a flame. That is all Peter is - the spark I got from you."

When Sylvia and her husband Arthur died of cancer, Barrie became the guardian of their sons.

George, one of the sons, died in the First World War, Michael drowned himself with a friend in Oxford, and Peter, who became a publisher, committed suicide in 1960. Kensington Gardens has a bronze statue of Peter Pan commissioned by the author in 1906. Barrie died on June 19 1937 at the age of 77.