LOUIS Longhi, the owner of Bleak House at Broadstairs where Charles Dickens once lived, has died at the age of 70.

Mr Longhi, of Swiss-Italian extraction, came from a family that was well known and much-respected throughout Broadstairs. He began life as a chef and he and his father ran Longhi’s restaurant on Margate seafront before and after the Second World War.

He was a celebrated sportsman, a rugby player with Thanet Wanderers, and a boxer.

Tony Gayler, of Broadstairs, a friend of the family, said: “We will be mourning a great bloke. Like Bleak House itself, Louis was very much part of the Broadstairs scene.”

Dr Roddy Macaulay, a friend for some years, said: “Louis was a great spirit with a fund of amusing stories about America where he had travelled extensively in his youth.

“A man of many talents, he enjoyed painting and among other works painted a huge mural of a ship on the wall of a shop in Albion Street, Broadstairs.

“For a while he owned The Old Curiotisyt Shop in Harbour Street and did a lot of work on it, and of course the extensive work he did on Bleak House is well known along with his efforts to preserve the cultural inheritance of Charles Dickens.”