Weil Gotshal & Manges has secured the Barclay brothers as a trophy client after corporate partner Marco Compagnoni completed his first deal for the duo since joining the US firm from Lovells earlier this year.

Compagnoni has acted for the media tycoons on their £100m acquisition of the De Vere Cavendish hotel in London's Jermyn Street.

The deal, which closed on Friday (15 September), saw the brothers buy the four-star hotel from the Alternative Hotel Group, which recently bought the De Vere Group for £746m. DLA Piper real estate partner Karen Friebe advised De Vere on the transaction.

Compagnoni has acted for the Barclay brothers for 12 years and became their main relationship partner at Lovells around 10 years ago.

The brothers effectively moved all their work over to Weil Gotshal when Compagnoni switched firms, but this is the first public deal on which Compagnoni has been instructed since joining.

The win will be seen as a coup by many in the market, as the Barclay brothers were one of Compagnoni's busiest clients at Lovells, generating a stream of regular work including high profile acquisitions of The Telegraph Group and Littlewoods, worth £729.5m and £750m respectively.

Compagnoni told Legal Week: "They came over straight away so we have done a few things for them already. They would be a trophy client for anyone to have."

Compagnoni worked alongside Weil Gotshal colleagues corporate partner Will Rosen and associate John Newton on the hotel acquisition.

The deal came the same week that Compagnoni did his first deal for Hg Capital since the private equity house shook up its panel earlier this summer, breaking its ties with Lovells and instead signing firms including Weil Gotshal, Linklaters and Dickson Minto to its adviser list.

The recent deal saw Weil Gotshal advising the buy-out house on the take-private of SHL Group with Barlow Lyde & Gilbert acting for SHL and Eversheds acting for the management.