A Robbie Williams robot statue is looming over the Wiltshire countryside years after it traded stadium crowds for garden foliage. The giant mechanical figure, known as Om, once formed the centrepiece of Take That’s 2011 Progress Live tour. Now its metal head can reportedly be seen above the bushes at the singer’s former estate, surprising nearby residents who did not ask for a faceless concert prop as a neighbour.
The precise story of how Om remained at Compton Bassett House is less clear than the photographs suggest. Williams sold the property in January 2022, but no public report has established whether the machine was included in the sale, left under a separate arrangement or still belongs to him.
Why is Om standing in a Wiltshire garden?
Williams bought Compton Bassett House for £8.1 million in 2008. The 71-acre estate included seven bedrooms, a football pitch, tennis court, helicopter hangar, spa and indoor swimming pool.
During Take That’s Progress Live tour in 2011, fellow member Jason Orange said Williams had claimed Om and intended to reconstruct it at home. VICE later documented the robot standing among foliage on the Wiltshire property in 2019, confirming that it had made the transition from touring machinery to unusually assertive garden ornament.
Williams sold the estate in January 2022 after its asking price was reduced to £6.75 million. Using the reported purchase and asking-price figures produces a difference of roughly £1.35 million, although those figures do not settle the robot’s ownership or the final terms of the property transaction.
No statement has been reported from Williams, the current owner, Wiltshire Council or Compton Bassett parish authorities about Om’s ownership, planning status or possible removal. Calling it “abandoned,” therefore, goes further than the available evidence. It is definitely there. The paperwork is another matter.
How large is the Take That tour robot?
Reports do not agree on Om’s dimensions, partly because the machine could be measured in different positions. The original account described the figure as 60 feet tall, while Music Week reported that it was 20 metres long and cost £1.5 million. A contemporaneous report based on BBC coverage put its fully upright height at 30 metres, or about 100 feet.
That variation may reflect the difference between its body length, stage configuration and maximum upright position rather than three entirely different robots. What is not disputed is that Om was built on a scale suited to stadiums, not subtle landscaping.
The machine also had a complicated working life. During a 2011 performance in Manchester, a malfunction left Take That members Mark Owen and Howard Donald stranded on its hands around 10 feet above the stage. The group acknowledged that machinery of that size carried a risk of further problems.
Its current condition is unknown. There has been no confirmed account of whether its moving parts still function, whether it has been maintained or whether it now serves only as an extremely expensive metal landmark.
What have local residents said?
Residents discussing the structure in the Facebook group Calne in Photographs were not universally reassured by its presence.
Kristina Spiro Bowen called it a “creepy fella,” while Liz Neve wrote: “I wondered what that was! I was concerned that the locals might be building up to a reenactment of the Wicker Man.” Jane Collett added: “I saw it only yesterday! Spooky.”
Those comments have not been independently located outside the group, but they capture the practical effect of placing a giant, expressionless stage robot among trees. Drivers and passers-by can reportedly spot its head emerging from the vegetation, with little context to explain why it is watching over rural Wiltshire.
Williams, now 52, is reported to divide his time among The Bahamas, West London and Switzerland. There is no indication that he has announced plans to retrieve Om or return it to touring use.
Williams has embraced stranger public moments
The robot’s reappearance follows another characteristically unusual episode involving Williams at the recently concluded World Cup. During a live interview, an unidentified white object fell from his mouth and later stuck to his forehead, quickly generating memes and online speculation.
Williams explained that it was a Nicorette mint. Social media inevitably named the episode “MintGate,” because even basic nicotine-replacement products apparently require a scandal title once cameras are involved.
“I think I reached peak me at the World Cup,” Williams wrote afterward. “To have a Nicorette fall out of my mouth during a live interview… and then stick to my forehead… is the most me thing I’ve ever done.”
He said the clip had reached millions of viewers before he became aware of it the following day. “It wouldn’t feel right if I appeared on the world stage and absolutely nothing weird happened,” he concluded.
Om offers a more permanent version of that unpredictability. The robot began as a seven-figure piece of stadium engineering, survived an onstage malfunction and eventually settled into the grounds of a country estate. Until someone clarifies who owns it and what happens next, Wiltshire’s largest piece of Take That memorabilia appears content to keep staring.
