This Kentuckian buccaneer founded Sea Containers in 1965. He is best known though buying the Hotel Cipriani in Venice for less than £1 million “on a whim” and reviving the Venice-Simplon-Orient-Express. A true perfectionist with an attention to detail unlike any other, Sherwood was victorious in 2010 in a battle with the Cipriani family over their using his hotel’s name in London and also founded Harry’s Bar in Mayfair with Mark Birley. He is married to the leading expert on botanical art, Dr Shirley Sherwood OBE, and was once stranded at 16,000 feet in the Andes with Princess Michael of Kent after his helicopter had to make an emergency landing.