Kate to quit London

She has been one of London's most famous residents for several years but now Kate Winslet has exchanged the capital for the countryside.

The 28-year-old actress this week sold the five-bedroom Belsize Park townhouse she has shared with film director husband Sam Mendes since April 2002.

The four-storey home cost the couple a little more than £2 million two years ago and is believed to have been sold for just less than £2.8 million. The couple, their baby Joe and Winslet's daughter Mia, three, are moving to £3.3 million, 14th-century Westcote Manor in the Cotswolds.

The eight-bedroom property is in 22 acres. Renovations worth £1.5 million are being completed. A barn has been turned into a cinema, rehearsal room and film-editing suite.

Yesterday afternoon removals men took the couple's possessions into storage while they carry on working in New York.

The sale was confirmed by Winslet's New York-based publicist, Robert Garloch. "I would say it went through in the last week or so," he said. "Kate only told me she put the house up for sale three or four weeks ago."