Prince Charles and Gordon Brown share a joke during the tour

The Prince showed the chancellor ongoing work at Poundbury, Dorchester, the rural estate he helped to design.

Built on land owned by the Duchy of Cornwall, the village is Charles's ideal of an urban town extension.

The village was designed to provide a mix of indistinguishable housing for different social groups.

Work on the high-profile estate began in 1993 and about 750 people now live there, with about 2,200 homes to be built in total.

David Morrish, joint managing director of Morrish Builders, one of the developers on site, said: "Gordon Brown was particularly interested in the market and how sales are going.

"I told him it was picking up at the moment slightly."

The Prince hopes the village, which was inspired by his 1989 book A Vision of Britain, will be a model for other parts of the country wishing to break the mould of post-war developments by mixing high-density housing with work and leisure facilities.

It suffered a setback in August last year after residents successfully battled against proposals for 31 flats, two retail shops and parking to be built at Jubilee Court.