In the hit Netflix show Emily in Paris, Lily Collins‘s character is captivated by the romantic French capital.
But in real life, it seems, the actress’s heart lies in London.
Lily, 36, is planning to move from Los Angeles to the capital with her husband, film director Charlie McDowell, and their year-old daughter Tove.
Sources say she has been eyeing up a return to Britain since ‘falling in love’ with London during her 12-week run in the West End thriller Barcelona over Christmas in 2024.
Now Lily, daughter of pop star Phil Collins, hopes to make the move permanent as she considers school options for Tove, who was born via a surrogate in January last year.
A source said: ‘Lily grew up in the English countryside with many happy memories and she wants the same for her daughter.
‘But instead of the countryside, she has fallen in love with London because that’s where she has lots of friends and family.
‘She is particularly taken with the north, like Hampstead and Queen’s Park.’
Lily Collins (left) is planning to move from Los Angeles to the capital with her husband, film director Charlie McDowell (right), and their year-old daughter Tove (centre)
Sources say the actress (pictured in December) has been eyeing up a return to Britain since ‘falling in love’ with London during her 12-week run in the West End thriller Barcelona over Christmas in 2024
A source said: ‘She is particularly taken with the north, like Hampstead and Queen’s Park’. Pictured: File photo of Hampstead Heath
Lily will join a long list of A-listers who have fled the US for Britain amid Donald Trump’s presidency.
Barbie star Ryan Gosling lives in Hampstead, while former chat show host Ellen DeGeneres moved to the Cotswolds.
Lily has been dividing her time between Copenhagen, where she has a £1million home with McDowell, 42, and Los Angeles, where her mother, antique shop owner Jill Tavelman, is based.
She and McDowell sold their LA home, in Pasadena where Meryl Streep was a neighbour, for £4.5million last year.
Lily grew up in an eight-bedroom house in Guildford before her parents’ divorce in 1996 when she was seven.
She then moved between West Sussex, where her father lived, and LA before locating to the US full-time to pursue her career.
Spending time in London last January, she said it ‘felt like home’. She said: ‘Most of all I love sitting upstairs at the front of a double-decker bus.
‘I don’t have a plan on where I want to go, I just sit and see all the sights and people.’
Emily in Paris follows American marketing executive Emily Cooper as she works in the French capital. The fourth series saw her move to Rome.
Asked last year if there would be an Emily in London, Lily said a spin-off ‘would be fun’. With Lily set to make London her home, perhaps that spin-off got a tad closer.
