Cartier used to be a Timpson’s for the rich
In the fall of, I suppose, 1962, my friend Jimmy Davison and I, window shopping on Fifth Avenue, bumped into…
Designer’s notebook
Zut alors! The court of King Boris gets more like Versailles each day. With some talcum powder on that ramshackle…
Nicky Haslam: How will Boris decorate No. 10?
‘Volcanic temper… suspicious of everyone… irritability, mood swings… terror stalking the shadows… devastating collapse of Europe’s economy… rampant insecurity, unbridled…
The Wallis Simpson I knew – by Nicky Haslam
One would have thought this particular can of worms might, after nearly 80 years, be well past its sell-by date.…
Bryant’s tyrants: Chris Bryant bashes the British aristocracy
I rashly discarded this book’s dustjacket when I received it, and thus saw only the unlettered cover, a faded photograph…
Girl power
Many years ago, working on a project in Tel Aviv, I had a meeting-free weekend. I know, I thought, I’ll…
Vanity fair and foul
People tend to use the term ‘fashion victim’ somewhat damningly — and maybe jealously — to describe someone obsessed by…
Majesty of the malls
In this autobiography, Mary Portas doesn’t dip into the fabled store of her talents by giving an account of her…
Diary
I was once bundled into a police car in Palm Springs to explain why I didn’t have snow-tyres on my…
Shock and awe
A comet streaked into France in the 1930s, its fallout sending the staid echelons of haute couture into a tailspin.…
Un-Beaton
The odds were a hundred to one against him. Brought up in bourgeois Bayswater by genteel parents, Cecil Beaton was…
Talking pictures
Beaton was the great inventor. Apart from inventing not only himself but his look, his voice, his persona and a…
Designer Notebook
This summer brought highs and lows, sadness and laughter, some irritating, some exhilarating. I was fortunate to be uplifted by…
A way with the stars
Many people write, or at least used to write, fan letters to their film favourites. Usually all they received in…
