Marylebone Journal issue 97

Marylebone Journal marylebonejournal.com

Marylebone Village marylebonevillage.com Instagram: @marylebonevillage Twitter: @MaryleboneVllge

Portman Marylebone portmanmarylebone.com Instagram: @portmanmarylebone

Publisher LSC Publishing lscpublishing.com

Editor Mark Riddaway mark@lscpublishing.com

Advertising sales Donna Earrey 020 7401 2772 donna@lscpublishing.com

Contributers Jean-Paul Aubin-Parvu Lauren Bravo Ellie Costigan Clare Finney Orlando Gili Emily Jupp Viel Richardson

Design and art direction Em-Project Limited mike@em-project.com

Owned and supported by The Howard de Walden Estate 23 Queen Anne Street, W1G 9DL 020 7580 3163 hdwe.co.uk annette.shiel@hdwe.co.uk

The Portman Estate 40 Portman Square, W1H 6LT 020 7563 1400 portmanestate.co.uk kate.jonsson@portmanestate.co.uk

MARYLEBONE JOURNAL ISSUE NO.97

BROUGHT TO YOU BY THE HOWARD DE WALDEN ESTATE AND THE PORTMAN ESTATE

Cover: Lyn Harris of Perfumer H, by Orlando Gili

HAPPENINGS 3 IN MARYLEBONE

Events, exhibitions, film, music, shopping, talks, theatre and walks

IN PROFILE: 14 TREVOR GULLIVER

The co-founder of the St JOHN restaurants on aspiring to permanence, running a happy ship, and why Fergus Henderson is the group’s ‘director of enjoyment’

SCENTS OF 20 PLACE

Lyn Harris of Perfumer H on her mission to translate the scents of nature into compelling perfumes

THE DIFFERENCE 31 MAKERS

Penny Alexander, chief executive of the Baker Street Quarter Partnership

A CLOSER 34 LOOK

Food, style, home, wellbeing and healthcare Q&A: 34 DAISUKE HAYASHI

The head chef at Roketsu on kaiseki dining, Kyoto, and the importance of quality ingredients

Q&A: 42 CLARA FRANCIS & TANIA HINDMARCH

The O Pioneers founders on dopamine dressing, ploughing their own furrow and why pockets are feminist

GIFT 54 GUIDE

A small selection of Christmas gifts from Marylebone’s many magnificent shops

ANATOMY OF 56 A DESIGN

Robin Maude of Vitsœ on a chair that was first launched in 1962 and brought up to date by its legendary designer in 2013

Celebrating Christmas in the community!

Join King Edward VII’s Hospital for an evening of carols at St. Marylebone Parish Church to celebrate Christmas and raise money for a good cause.

Sir Derek Jacobi CBE and a number of other special guests will be joining on the night for an evening of beautiful music and Christmas spirit.

Tickets priced at £25 per person, or £40 for two and include mulled wine and mince pies.

All proceeds go towards funding the Centre for Veterans’ Health ground-breaking Pain Management Programme and 100% Military Grants.

This promises to be a very special start to the Christmas period. We look forward to seeing you there.

To book tickets scan the QR code or go to https://tinyurl.com/pn6y7j9t

Alternatively you can search King Edward VII’s Hospital on the Eventbrite website.

HAPPENINGS IN MARYLEBONE EVENTS EXHIBITIONS

FILM MUSIC SHOPPING TALKS THEATRE WALKS

1. Bordeaux Masterclass Tasting, Philglas & Swiggot

2. Halo by Karolina Halatek, SoShiro

FOOD 24 NOVEMBER, 12pm FOOD MARKET AT 55 BAKER STREET

Baker Street Quarter Partnership bakerstreetq.co.uk

The Baker Street Quarter’s fortnightly food market in the covered atrium of 55 Baker Street gathers together a small but diverse range of independent street-food stalls, offering a mouthwatering alternative to the usual workday lunch.

MUSIC 22 – 25 NOVEMBER

ROYAL ACADEMY OPERA: THE RAKE’S PROGRESS Royal Academy of Music Marylebone Road, NW1 5HT ram.ac.uk

Conducted by Trevor Pinnock and directed by Frederic WakeWalker, Royal Academy Opera students perform Stravinsky’s only English language opera – a work inspired by William Hogarth’s engravings, with lyrical input from the poet WH Auden.

WINE TASTING

23 NOVEMBER, 7pm BORDEAUX MASTERCLASS TASTING

Philglas & Swiggot 22 New Quebec Street, W1H 7SB philglas-swiggot.com

Simon Gossart, European sales director at the House of Schröder & Schÿler, leads a tour of Bordeaux, a fascinating but much misunderstood wine region. Taste examples from some legendary appellations alongside a cheese and charcuterie sharing board.

2.

EXHIBITION

A show featuring six female artists, linked by their fascination with the creative possibilities of light. Tamar Frank presents a series of small light panels whose central focus blends into different colour compositions. Chila Singh Burman examines the symbolic power of the peacock. Karolina Halatek’s immersive installation based on a rare astronomical phenomenon. Kate McMillan’s film explores the life of a cave-dwelling girl. Jacqueline Hen creates the illusion of an infinite space, inspired by how the digital realm warps perception. Lauren Baker’s six-image lenticular, backed by an LED light box, depicts “a galactic explosion of shooting stars and space matter”.

14 – 25 NOVEMBER COLLECTED LIGHT SoShiro 23 Welbeck Street, W1G 8DZ soshiro.co

EXHIBITION

9 – 26 NOVEMBER

JO TAYLOR: LIBERATE Thompson’s Gallery

3 Seymour Place, W1H 5AZ thompsonsgallery.co.uk

Jo Taylor, who honed her skill as a painter of animals during an artist’s residency at the University of Liverpool’s department of veterinary science, presents a series of equestrian paintings notable for their dynamism, power and expression as well as their technical accuracy.

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EXHIBITION

UNTIL 26 NOVEMBER

THE BLACK TRIANGLE Atlas Gallery 49 Dorset Street, W1U 7NF atlasgallery.com

Named after photographer Armet Francis’s descriptor of the deep historic connections that link people of colour in the Americas and Caribbean, Europe and Africa, this powerful exhibition presents images from the long fight against racist ideologies and policies on three continents.

1. L iberate by Jo Taylor, Thompson’s Gallery

2. F irst Notting Hill Street Party 1968 by Charlie Phillips, Atlas Gallery 3. Septura, Royal Academy of Music 4. Duke Ellington, Royal Academy of Music

5. C olored Lights, Royal Academy of Music

5. Ian Bostridge, Wigmore Hall

4.

5.

WALK 29 NOVEMBER, 12pm

SHERLOCK WALKING TOUR

Baker Street Quarter Partnership bakerstreetq.co.uk

Organised by the Baker Street Quarter Partnership and led by a Blue Badge guide, this free walking tour of Baker Street and beyond takes in the many Marylebone buildings and landmarks associated with author Arthur Conan Doyle and his most famous fictional creation, Sherlock Holmes.

MUSIC

30 NOVEMBER, 8pm

ACADEMY JAZZ ORCHESTRA

PERFORMS THE MUSIC OF DUKE

ELLINGTON

Royal Academy of Music Marylebone Road, NW1 5HT ram.ac.uk

Directed by Giacomo Smith, Academy students present two of Duke Ellington’s big band suites: The Queen’s Suite, a pressing of which was presented to Elizabeth II in 1959, and the Nutcracker Suite, a unique take on Tchaikovsky’s ballet.

MUSIC

The Academy Musical Theatre Company performs an end-of-year concert celebrating the work of the legendary songwriting team of composer John Kander and lyricist Fred Ebb, whose slate of 20 classic Broadway musicals includes both Cabaret and Chicago.

6 DECEMBER, 2.30pm & 7.30pm

COLORED LIGHTS: THE SONGS OF KANDER AND EBB

Royal Academy of Music Marylebone Road, NW1 5HT ram.ac.uk

MUSIC

6 DECEMBER, 7.30pm IAN BOSTRIDGE & CAPPELLA NEAPOLITANA

Wigmore Hall 36 Wigmore Street, W1U 2BP wigmore-hall.org.uk

Conducted by Antonio Florio, acclaimed English tenor Ian Bostridge performs a spectacular set of Italian arias from Caresana, Cavalli, Cesti and many more, in tandem with a Neapolitan orchestra that specialises in the Baroque repertoire.

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MUSIC

2 DECEMBER, 1pm

SEPTURA SIDE BY SIDE: FORGOTTEN OPERAS

Royal Academy of Music Marylebone Road, NW1 5HT ram.ac.uk

Members of the London-based brass ensemble Septura join Academy students to perform three intriguing but largely neglected works from British, French and American composers, alongside a new work by an Academy student, Jonty Watt.

WALK

7 DECEMBER, 6pm

CHRISTMAS LIGHTS WALKING TOUR

Baker Street Quarter Partnership bakerstreetq.co.uk

A professional guide leads a walk around the area’s Christmas Lights and tells the hidden stories behind each installation, including 16 festive geese on Marylebone Road and the lights at 55 Baker Street, Portman Square Garden and Manchester Square Garden.

WINE TASTING

8 DECEMBER, 7pm

DISCOVER BURGUNDY WINE

Philglas & Swiggot

22 New Quebec Street, W1H 7SB philglas-swiggot.com

Burgundy specialist leads a journey through the homeland of chardonnay and pinot noir, explaining how terroir and technique can influence the final product and highlighting hidden gems along the way. Taste a selection of wines alongside a cheese and charcuterie sharing board.

MUSIC

15 DECEMBER

THE CARDUCCI QUARTET Marylebone Theatre

Rudolf Steiner House, 35 Park Road, NW1 6XT marylebonetheatre.com

The Anglo-Irish string quartet presents a programme of works by Haydn and Beethoven, as well as music by Rebecca Clarke, one of Britain’s first female professional orchestral players and a highly accomplished –and depressingly overlooked –modernist composer.

2.

FILM

UNTIL 16 DECEMBER SECRET ROOFTOP CINEMA EXPERIENCE

Kitchen at Holmes 108 Baker Street, W1U 6LJ kitchenatholmes.co.uk

Kitchen at Holmes is offering dinner from a new festive menu, followed by a rooftop screening of a beloved Christmas film, such as The Holiday, It’s a Wonderful Life or A Miracle on 34th Street, surrounded by comfy throws, Christmas trees, fairy lights and plenty to drink.

MUSIC

17 DECEMBER, 7.30pm

SOLOMON’S KNOT: KUHNAU CHRISTMAS CANTATAS Wigmore Hall 36 Wigmore Street, W1U 2BP wigmore-hall.org.uk

300 years after his death, the Solomon’s Knot ensemble performs five festive cantatas by a remarkable German polymath, Johann Kuhnau –a composer, music theorist, novelist, translator, lawyer and predecessor to JS Bach as Thomaskantor in Leipzig.

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MUSIC

The National Youth Jazz Orchestra, which gives opportunities to musicians under the age of 25, celebrates Dizzy Gillespie, the trumpeter, bandleader, composer and singer whose musicianship, showmanship and wit defined the sound of 1940s bebop.

9 DECEMBER, 7.30pm

SHOPPING 24 NOVEMBER, 1, 8, 15 & 22 DECEMBER, 5-7pm

CHRISTMAS CAROLS IN PORTMAN MARYLEBONE Portman Marylebone portmanmarylebone.com/events

MARK ARMSTRONG & NYJO PRESENT:

GILLESPIE Marylebone Theatre

Rudolf Steiner House, 35 Park Road, NW1 6XT marylebonetheatre.com

Enjoy the sound of festive choirs roaming the streets of Portman Marylebone in the early evening, every Thursday in the lead-up to Christmas. As well as traditional festive music, there will be plenty of mulled wine available and opportunities for late-night shopping.

DIZZY

EXHIBITION

7 – 23 DECEMBER

NEW ENGLISH ART CLUB

Thompson’s Gallery

3 Seymour Place, W1H 5AZ thompsonsgallery.co.uk

Founded in 1886 by impressionst artists dissatisfied with the stuffy, hidebound attitudes of the Royal Academy, the New English Arts Club is an elected society of painters. Today, its membership is increasingly diverse in approach, as this group exhibition clearly shows.

MUSIC

1. Dizzy Gillespie, Marylebone Theatre

2. Skating, Midday, Somerset House, London by Andrew Macara, New English Arts Club, Thompson’s Gallery

3. Il Pomo D’oro Choir, Wigmore Hall

4. L ove Goddess, The Cockpit

THEATRE 18 NOVEMBER – 23 DECEMBER

LOVE GODDESS

The Cockpit Gateforth Street, NW8 8EH thecockpit.org.uk

This new musical by New Yorkbased writer and performer Almog Pail – who also stars –and co-writer Stephen Garvey tells the story of Rita Hayworth, whose personal struggles through five failed marriages and a slow decline with Alzheimer’s contrasted starkly with her gilded Hollywood career.

4.

Il Pomo D’oro Choir, the recently established choral wing of one of Italy’s leading period-instrument orchestras, presents a selection of music suitable for Christmas Vespers, including works from Frescobaldi, Grandi and Monteverdi.

23 DECEMBER, 7.30pm

IL POMO D’ORO CHOIR

Wigmore Hall 36 Wigmore Street, W1U 2BP wigmore-hall.org.uk

Q&A: EMMA WITTER

The artist on working with waste materials, the beauty of animal bone, and the meal that first inspired her

Interview: Viel Richardson Images: Gaëtan Bernède

Best known for her work using animal bone, artist Emma Witter creates elaborate and delicate art out of objects that are usually ignored or discarded. Set in the elegant surrounds of a Georgian townhouse on The Portman Estate, her new exhibition Movable Feast continues this theme. A proportion of the sales will be donated to charity partner City Harvest which distributes over a million meals a month to those who need it most, made from surplus food that would otherwise be thrown away.

Q: What first interested you in using non-traditional materials like bone for your art?

A: I studied performance design, which is a very different field. Many of the fine arts like sculpture or bronze casting felt quite unattainable. I liked the idea of playing around with food and other organic matter so I just started using what was available. When I started experimenting with bone, I fell in love with its textural quality.

Q: What was it about it about bone that attracted you?

A: I remember having oxtail stew for dinner one day and thinking how beautiful the oxtail bone was, how it looked like an orchid. It was this beautiful, symmetrical object. Throwing it away felt like such a

waste. Bones are incredibly strong yet very lightweight and easy to carve. It’s a wonderful material. As you carve deeper, the bone’s structure means you begin releasing more textural qualities. It’s very generous as a material for an artist, but it is also quite naughty, it wants to fight you a little and you have to develop a relationship with each piece as you work.

Q: Does it take a lot of preparation?

A: Bone is essentially made up of roughly equal parts mineral and fat. I need to remove all of that fat. This can be done in kilns at high temperatures,

but I use bleach which is a much softer process.

Q: How would you describe the exhibition?

A: There is a botanical theme. My obsession is with trying to make something that’s beautiful and graceful using a form through which people aren’t used to appreciating beauty. It’s a way of making us reassess the material we’re looking at. Many people have a psychological relationship to bone that stands in the way of them seeing it as the incredible material it is.

The works are very small and intricate. I want people to have to go up close and really look. When I’m creating these pieces, I go into this hyper-focused state where the world dissolves around me and I am fully present in the moment. I want people to share that feeling for a few moments. I’m known for working in bone, but this show has a breadth of materials. There’s eggshell and oyster shell. There’s ash made from bones I found in the Thames and then fired.

Q: How did you begin your career as an artist?

A: I was in a group show at Mark Hix’s steak and chicken restaurant, Tramshed. It was the first time I had exhibited. Mark has a deep connection to the arts and the

restaurant had a gallery downstairs. I loved the fact that as a space it wasn’t intimidating like a traditional art gallery can be. You could just come down after dinner to see the art; it felt as welcoming as the restaurant. I asked Mark for a small space in the corner of the gallery. He said yes and that led to my first solo show.

Q: How do people react to you working with bones?

A: At Tramshed, there was one guy who had no problem working with bones in the restaurant all day, but when he saw them after I had cleaned and categorised them he wouldn’t come near the table. It really freaked him out. It seemed the further the bones were removed from being food the more it scared him. I’ve had strict vegans have no issue with the bones because for them they were not related to food and were just another material like wood or paint. I’ve had others say my work glorifies the abuse of animals. People from different countries can react very differently, as bone can inhabit different spaces in each culture. For example, in cultures in hot, dry climates, dried bones are a common sight, and people often collect them for trinkets like we do rocks or shells.

1. Merry Marylebone Christmas, Marylebone Village

2. Dunedin Consort, Wigmore Hall

SHOPPING

Throughout December, many of the fantastic retailers and restaurants of Marylebone Village will be offering special Christmas promotions and online events as part of the Merry Marylebone Christmas campaign. To keep fully updated on the multitude of offers, visit the Marylebone Village website or follow on social media.

UNTIL 31 DECEMBER

MERRY MARYLEBONE CHRISTMAS Marylebone Village marylebonevillage.com

1.

Q:

Tell us about the exhibition space.

A: I really like the fact that it isn’t a space that you would normally go to view art. It’s in a beautiful 17th century listed building. There’s a guardianship element to my time there, because it’s currently standing empty. The Portman Estate let me have the space until January, with the potential to relocate to another available unit on expiry. That forces me to be quite malleable, which is all part of the exhibition experience. That’s why the title of the show is Moveable Feast!

EMMA WITTER: MOVEABLE FEAST UNTIL JANUARY Suite 7, 75 Gloucester Place, W1U 8JP emmawitter.co.uk

MUSIC

31 DECEMBER, 7pm

DUNEDIN CONSORT, RACHEL REDMOND, JAMES HALL, HUGO HYMAS, ROBERT DAVIES Wigmore Hall

36 Wigmore Street, W1U 2BP wigmore-hall.org.uk

For a New Year’s Eve spectacular, some of Britain’s leading performers come together to play suitably celebratory works, including two of Bach’s cantatas: the lavishly scored No.63, and No.110, first performed on Christmas Day 1725.

MUSIC

5 JANUARY, 7.30pm LIZA FERSCHTMAN

Wigmore Hall

36 Wigmore Street, W1U 2BP wigmore-hall.org.uk

Dutch violinist Liza Ferschtman performs two sets of works for solo violin by JS Bach that remained unpublished until more than 50 years after the German composer’s death. They have continued to inspire composers and challenge even the most gifted of players ever since.

EXHIBITION

Richard Long, a singular presence in British conceptual art since the 1960s, has trodden many a path to create the narratives that inform his work. His explorations of the world’s landscapes, and the physical interventions he has made along the way, are recounted through photographs, maps and text.

16 NOVEMBER – 21 JANUARY

RICHARD LONG

Lisson Gallery

27 Bell Street, NW1 5BY lissongallery.com

THEATRE

18 NOVEMBER – 7 JANUARY

A SHERLOCK CAROL Marylebone Theatre

Rudolf Steiner House, 35 Park Road, NW1 6XT marylebonetheatre.com

Ebenezer Scrooge is dead in mysterious circumstance. Distraught, a grown-up and not-so-Tiny Tim visits Sherlock Holmes to ask him to investigate. Once again, the night is haunted by spirits. Can Holmes overcome his own ghosts to solve the mystery?

1.

EXHIBITION

UNTIL 8 JANUARY THE LOST KING

The Wallace Collection

Manchester Square, W1U 3BN wallacecollection.org

This free display explores how key objects at The Wallace Collection have influenced perceptions of Richard III through literature, theatre, art and film. Visitors can also view the replica armour created for The Lost King, the recently released film about the search for his burial place. 2.

FOOD

12 JANUARY, 12pm

FOOD MARKET AT 55 BAKER

STREET

Baker Street Quarter Partnership bakerstreetq.co.uk

The Baker Street Quarter’s fortnightly food market in the covered atrium of 55 Baker Street gathers together a small but diverse range of independent street-food stalls, offering a mouthwatering alternative to the usual workday lunch.

MUSIC

12 JANUARY, 7.30pm

MARIAM BATSASHVILI

Wigmore Hall

36 Wigmore Street, W1U 2BP wigmore-hall.org.uk

Mariam Batsashvili, a brilliant Georgian pianist praised by Fanfare magazine for her “luminous and beautifully rounded” playing, performs an eye-catching programme of works by Beethoven at his grandest and Liszt at his most atmospheric and colourful.

1. Richard Long, Lisson Gallery

2. T he Lost King, The Wallace Collection

3. A Child in Striped Pyjamas, The Cockpit

3.

THEATRE

11 – 12 JANUARY, 7.30pm

A CHILD IN STRIPED PYJAMAS The Cockpit Gateforth Street, NW8 8EH thecockpit.org.uk

Noah Max’s new opera, performed here for the first time, is based on John Boyne’s bestselling Holocaust fable, The Boy In The Striped Pyjamas. Two children, known to us only as Jewish Child and German Child, find theselves separated by barbed wire but united in friendship.

EXHIBITION

16 NOVEMBER – 21 JANUARY VAN HANOS Lisson Gallery 67 Lisson Street, NW1 5DA lissongallery.com

The defining characteristic of Texas-based artist Van Hanos is his admirable refusal to have just one defining characteristic. For this exhibition, his first solo show in London, the paintings range from meticulous, densely detailed oil reproductions of photographic images to playful abstractions.

P.14→

Trevor Gulliver, the cofounder of the St JOHN restaurants, on aspiring to permanence, running a happy ship, and why Fergus Henderson is the group’s ‘director of enjoyment’

4.

1.

EXHIBITION

7 DECEMBER – 21 JANUARY

CHRISTOFOROS SAVVA: UNBOUND

The Hellenic Centre 16-18 Paddington Street, W1U 5AS helleniccentre.org

The first-ever London show devoted to one of the 20th century’s most pioneering Cypriot artists, this exhibition takes a close look at Savva’s paintings, cement reliefs, pin reliefs and ‘yfasmatographies’ and explores the themes that run through the collection.

EXHIBITION

UNTIL 25 JANUARY

YUKEN TERUYA: LA MER

Daiwa Anglo-Japanese Foundation

13-14 Cornwall Terrace, NW1 4QP dajf.org.uk

Marking the 50th year of the end of the American occupation of Okinawa, this exhibition presents the work of Yuken Teruya, an Okinawan artist known for using humble objects – cardboard, paper bags, newspapers, balloons – in ways that echo the city’s historical narrative.

EXHIBITION

Thembalethu Manqunyana, who hails from Gqeberha, in South Africa’s Eastern Cape has a distinctive, highly colourful approach to portraiture, which takes inspiration from the boundarybreaking work of artists like JeanMichel Basquiat and Blessing Ngobeni.

11 – 28 JANUARY

THEMBALETHU MANQUNYANA Thompson’s Gallery 3 Seymour Place, W1H 5AZ thompsonsgallery.co.uk

1. T he Singer by Thembalethu Manqunyana, Thompson’s Gallery

2. Two Women at a Table by Christoforos Savva, The Hellenic Centre

3. National Theatre Live: The Crucible, Everyman Baker Street

4. Wigmore Hall: Portraying Our People by Christopher Jonas, Wigmore Hall

THEATRE 26 JANUARY, 7pm

NATIONAL THEATRE LIVE: THE CRUCIBLE Everyman Baker Street 96-98 Baker Street, W1U 6TJ everymancinema.com

Captured live from the National Theatre, Arthur Miller’s witchhunt parable stars Erin Doherty (The Crown) and Brendan Cowell (Yerma). As fear, vendetta and accusation spread through Salem, Massachusetts, a group of young women find that their words have an almighty power.

EXHIBITION

UNTIL SEPTEMBER 2023

WIGMORE HALL: PORTRAYING OUR PEOPLE

Wigmore Hall

36 Wigmore Street, W1U 2BP wigmore-hall.org.uk

Photographer Christopher Jonas spent several months behind the scenes at Wigmore Hall, capturing candid shots of everyday life at one of the country’s most important musical venues. His fascinating exhibition shows a side of the Hall usually hidden from the public.

Trevor Gulliver, right, with his St JOHN co-founder Fergus Henderson

IN PROFILE

TREVOR

Words: Clare Finney Images: Sam Harris

“We’ve had the plague, the drought and the flood – but we still have the farm, and we have to reseed,” says Trevor Gulliver, co-founder of the St JOHN restaurants, as he tears contemplatively into a croissant. It’s an aptly bucolic analogy from the restauranteur, given he’s just spent half his morning overseeing the brewing of this year’s Eccles Stout: a happy marriage between the 40FT Brewery in Dalston and St JOHN’s famed Eccles cake mix. We’re catching up in the bakery next door to the brewery, where a discarded sign directing people to queue two metres apart serves as a stark reminder of just how recent the ‘plague’ was. “People have very short memories,” observes Trevor. “But not long ago, people were suddenly out of work. And as Brexit and everything else has shredded the economy in the last three years, you need to look to yourselves to build your ability to deal with the future. You need to fundamentally consider everything.”

A ll of which is to say, St JOHN has recently opened on Marylebone Lane – making this area the home of only the third restaurant from Fergus Henderson and Trevor Gulliver since they launched their first in Smithfield 28 years ago. In that time, the pair have become an institution on the national and international restaurant scene. They’ve pioneered relaxed, seasonal dining, a renewed appreciation for British produce and, most memorably, eating the whole animal. ‘Nose to tail’ is Fergus’s philosophy. They’ve written three books, opened bakeries in Covent Garden and Borough and established a winery in a village in Languedoc, southern France. Yet compared to other restauranteurs in London, their rate of expansion has been strikingly slow.

‘Organic’ is an overused term outside of agriculture. Yet the way Trevor describes his and Fergus’s “growth strategy” does bring to mind that long-termist, nature-led approach to farming. “We hopefully do have a native intelligence in doing things that make sense, that hold true to what’s important to us. We’ve never followed the zeitgeist; we’ve just done what we think is right at the time,” he says. The pandemic brought this into sharp relief. “We opened the bakery because people needed bread. We sorted delivery boxes so our chefs could still cook. We supplied our wine to local butchers so they could sell it alongside their meat and boost their revenue, as well as promote our wines.” As nature has been the mother of their regularly changing, seasonal menu and nose-to-tail eating, so necessity has proved the mother of their more recent incarnations – one of which proved to be St JOHN Marylebone.

For Trevor and Fergus, Marylebone presented an opportunity to see the St JOHN spirit spun out from sun-up to sun-down, seven days a week. It offered a space that could sell bread and coffee in the morning, a glass of champagne and a doughnut for elevenses – a meal Fergus famously champions – and wine and small plates for lunch

and dinner. “Over the years we’ve had a lot of people approaching us who are interested in what we make, bake and do – but we need to have the capacity, and we need to enjoy the making, baking and doing. That’s when it works well,” says Trevor. Opening the bakeries reassured them they could connect with busy areas, and having been born in Westminster and lived near Hyde Park for several years, Trevor has witnessed Marylebone’s evolution. “I believe we can have a relationship with the people who live and work there. I think they’ll appreciate what we do.” Beyond that, Trevor shrugs, “we will work it out when it works out itself.”

The pair have always been patient. Somewhat ironically, given St JOHN’s launch party is a fortnight away when we speak, Trevor explains that while he certainly likes a party, he’s not a big fan of ‘launches’. “In the old days you made something, and people bought it, and came back if it was good. Now you ‘launch’ a product. It’s more… instant gratification. These gung-ho chefs are spending all their

“In the old days you made something, and people bought it, and came back if it was good. Now you ‘launch’ a product. These gung-ho chefs are spending all their time on the media and social media when they should be in the kitchen, showing their staff and customers what they do. That is the way to build permanence. Fads and fashions –they aren’t good for food.”

time on the media and social media when they should be in the kitchen, teaching, creating and showing their staff and customers what they do. That is the way to build permanence,” he observes.

“Fads and fashions – they aren’t good for food,” Trevor continues. That word, ‘permanence’, is one you rarely here in these turbulent times, either in or outside of the restaurant industry, and yet it’s one he values now more than ever. “The world is dynamic, terrible – all kinds of adjectives, and there seems to be more of a reason than ever for us to do what we do and be purposeful and engaged.” Though he accepts that St JOHN is now an institution, he points out that “we have never called it that. We still are as we are. We’ve just been practicing for much longer, in the medical sense. We’ve done a lot of operations, as it were.”

T hat sense of permanence is lived out in St JOHN’s kitchen, out of which have come some of the most influential and talented chefs of recent years, and to which

many of the world’s most decorated chefs continue to flock. “We get three Michelin star chefs coming for stages [work experience], just to see how it works – because our kitchens are not at all big, there’s a small ratio of chefs to customers, yet it still turns over quietly.” He tells the story of a world-famous chef, who was so amazed at the quality and quantity of food they produced each night he was convinced there was a secret kitchen downstairs. “Many people don’t understand how or why we do what we do, and why it works – but we aren’t in the business of explaining, we’re in the business of doing. The best services are always the ones where no one notices.” It’s a warm buzz, a subtle energy, a smooth, easy flow from back of house through front of house to the happy, chatting customers.

Much is made of St JOHN’s alumni, which includes the Michelin-starred chef James Lowe of Lyle’s, beloved pastry chef and food writer Ravneet Gill, Tim Siadatan at Trullo and Padella, baker Justin Gellatly and many more. Even more is made of their nose-to-tail cooking. Yet the

Middle White chop, chicory and sorrel

Red mullet and green sauce

Deep fried rarebit

quieter miracle of St JOHN – the one its disciples often refer to – is its happy, collaborative, inclusive kitchen culture. Trevor looks slightly bemused when I point this out – because for him and Fergus running a kitchen that way has always been a no-brainer. “Happy kitchen, happy staff, happy customers. It’s a virtuous circle.” St JOHN has never had to actively create a more diverse, less masculine kitchen, he continues, because by running it how they do, their kitchen already “reflects the street outside”.

That said, toxic workplace cultures are less endemic in the industry than they once were – making it slightly disappointing that there seems to be a resurgence in edgy kitchen-based dramas like The Bear and Boiling Point. “It’s like, really? Again? It would be more fun and more valid to do something about fast food places. There’d be much more humour and bleak reality there. But that’s not sexy,” he sighs.

Once again, it comes down to their perennial quest for permanence, and to provide pleasure for themselves and the people they employ as well as their customers.

“Fergus still loves his cooking. He uses his hands and noises more to communicate, but he still speaks great chef, and everyone loves to speak with him. But it’s harder for him to be abreast of the widespread array of things that we do, and easier for him to just enjoy things. He’s our director of enjoyment.”

“A restaurant should be like an old friend,” Trevor says of the relationship between a restaurant and its diners. “Whenever you see them, you smile.” In the case of Fergus, the quest for enjoyment has become particularly pertinent recently as Parkinson’s – a disease he has fought valiantly since his mid30s – has started to compromise his ability to work in the way he once did. “He still loves his cooking. He uses his hands and noises more to communicate, but he still speaks great chef, and everyone loves to speak with him. But it’s harder for him to be abreast of the widespread array of things that we do, and a lot easier for him to just enjoy things instead.”

“He’s our director of enjoyment,” Trevor continues, smiling. “I want Fergus to be happy, and he is at his best chatting to chefs and enjoying himself.” Marylebone is a realisation of that. It is everything that is best about Fergus and Trevor, united under a Georgian roof and spread out across 15 languorous hours of the day, starting with breakfast. There are nods to the culinary luxuries Fergus enjoys, Trevor tells me: elevenses with doughnuts and champagne or his habitual seed cake and Madeira; bone marrow, offal and game; counter seating; caviar. There is wine aplenty, sourced by Trevor from their Languedoc winery and their growing collection of small-scale French winemakers who have, over time, become good friends.

Trevor and Fergus are often described as a double act; the food world’s answer to Gilbert and George. Like the artists, the restauranteurs dress in a dapper fashion and are strikingly different in stature. They even worked next door to Gilbert and George, when they opened their second restaurant in Spitalfields. “We once saw them coming down the street toward us. I said ‘quick Fergus, into the Ten Bells. People are laughing’,” Trevor recalls. Of their dynamic, he says simply: “We are different people, but we both have something to bring to St JOHN.” Fergus puts it on the plate and Trevor puts it in the glass, as the restaurants’ unofficial motto puts it. Yet if the pair are to cement the permanence they practice and preach, they need St JOHN to be able to outlive their tenure.

“ We hope St JOHN will be around for a long time after Fergus and myself, and that it will hold true to the tenets that are important to us. I want Fergus and I to be happy with St JOHN and the people running it, and to be happy ourselves. It’s like that analogy of the farm,” he continues. “We have the farm, and we’ve reseeded. And I hope that in our dotage, Fergus and I will be on the stoop in our rocking chairs, overlooking the fields and smoking our pipes and being very satisfied.”

ST JOHN MARYLEBONE 98 Marylebone Lane, W1U 2JE stjohnrestaurant.com

The Journal pays a visit to Perfumer H, home to the talents of Lyn Harris, one of the country’s most respected perfumers and a passionate advocate for the fragrances of nature

Words: Emily Jupp Images: Orlando Gili

SCENTS OF PLACE

Lynn Harris of Perfumer H

“I love sitting across from you and thinking, gosh, you would so suit Rain Cloud,” says Lyn Harris, giving me a discerning but friendly look. “Or Suede.”

Lyn, the founder of Perfumer H, is a British pioneer of natural fragrance and one of our country’s most distinctive perfume makers. She has become renowned and respected for her ability to replicate natural world experiences in scent.

R ain Cloud is a wet floral with ylang ylang, vetiver and angelica, which creates an interesting humidity. It smells like walking into a cloud, at the top of a mountain, overlooking a wildflower meadow, in a hot climate.

Suede is rather more, well, suede-like, with musky notes and white florals.

Lyn was exposed to great, natural smells from an early age and spent bucolic summers with her grandparents in the Scottish Highlands, where her interest in scent began. “My grandparents were self-sufficient, they had a smallholding and my grandmother would make jams and tisans, and she baked, so I would wake up to the smell of fresh bread each morning,” she says. “My grandfather was a carpenter and I loved to always be in his space. The garden was beautiful too – so the way we lived was all in tune with nature.”

L ater, when she trained formally, she wanted to capture the atmosphere from her childhood. “I was obsessed with translating these smells I had in my memory,” she explains.

We meet in Perfumer H’s new Chiltern Street shop, which is decorated in dark mossy greys and greens, with walnut wood shelves which show off the candles and perfumes, held in exquisite hand-blown glass vessels made by Michael Ruh.

T he brand has a second shop nearby on Crawford Street, which is where a creative lab and a refill station sit. You can take back any of the glass jars for a refill there – part of Perfumer H’s initiative to cut down on packaging and waste. Lyn’s desire is for the shops to provide accessible, unconventional fragrances that comprise natural scents, all in a sustainable way. “I don’t want people to be overwhelmed by the smell. I want it to be for them,” explains Lyn.

Her fascination with perfume began when she worked in her parent’s friends’ fragrance

shop in Yorkshire, aged 15. “I loved how it transformed people. It was only for very wealthy people, buying Guerlain and Chanel – and I loved couture and that connection with fashion.”

S chool wasn’t particularly supportive and she didn’t go on to university, like many of her peers. “I wasn’t academic,” she says, but that shop had captured her imagination. “And then I read about this course in Paris and my parents said: ‘Just go.’”

Monique Schlienger was the lone female perfumer among a sea of men who taught the course in a little school by the Eiffel Tower. Lyn was there for two years, including six months in Schlienger’s laboratory, where the French doyenne encouraged her young English pupil. Schlienger recognised Lyn’s talent and would teach her one on one. “She could see I wasn’t scared of anything... and I could put things together.” She would talk about the smells and tastes in her garden and they would go out to eat and analyse the flavours. During her time at the school, Lyn learnt how to dissect smells and how to combine them.

Perfumery is both art and science. Understanding the way the chemicals and natural oils combine is science, which required Lyn to attend chemistry lessons in French (thankfully, she was assigned a translator). What you choose to combine is art. “I love naturals, but you realise the chemicals beautify everything and make everything so easy. The science blows your mind. You are given a framework – there are set techniques for making a rose floral, say, or a white peach, or a herbaceous leather note, or a sweet powdery undertone with musk – and you take aspects of these and make a smell. You slowly develop your technique.”

A fter her time with Schlienger, Lyn had developed a good understanding of the basic formulae at the heart of the olfactory craft. “You’ve got maybe 200 materials,” she says. “Rose has maybe 30 different variants, sandalwood has 10.”

Leaving Paris, she moved to Grasse, a French Riviera town famed for fragrance production since the 18th century. There, she studied at Robertet, “the Chanel of fragrance houses”, known for creating the best natural oils in the industry. “Being in Grasse was breathtaking,” she says. “Robertet is owned by this incredible

“Perfumery often hides behind this mask. These perfumers are lords, kings! Why can’t I share some of my know-how with the world?”

SCENTS OF THE SEASON CHRISTMAS PICKS FROM PERFUMER H

SAFFRON PERFUME

The latest perfume from Perfumer H. Sensual, rich and warm. Saffron and sandalwood are enlivened by geranium leaf and frankincense on a base of cedar and papyrus with a hint of vanilla bourbon.

HONEY, SMOKE AND AMBER CANDLES

The seasonal candles launched for winter are three quite complementary scents, so you can light two at different ends of the room for an interesting olfactory journey.

PRESERVES

Preserves including marmalade, cucumber pickle and raspberry jam are all given a slight twist. The marmalade, perked up with a twist of bergamot and a pinch of lavender, has a cult following.

powerfully scented washing powder. How can

wear perfume on top of that? You can even get scented toilet roll now. It’s horrific.”

“You shouldn’t really be using a

you

I

family and they said to me, ‘make Grasse your home’.” As a young British woman, she considered herself a bit of a novelty among all the male masters, but the experience was extremely valuable. She still has all her notebooks from that time. “I looked at them just yesterday. Oh my God, they’re bibles.”

She met her partner in life and work, Christophe, while in Grasse. “We both love the world of perfume, we are ruled by it, but in a beautiful way.” It was there, too, that she developed her own olfactory language. This is, she says, like a personal shorthand for describing different smells. “For example, sage for me is a leathery, very velvety herb note but very clean and green or has a feeling of white, while clary sage is much more dirty – you interpret it differently and then you learn how to work with them.”

Despite its historic status as the world’s fragrance capital, all was not well in Grasse, which was becoming increasingly depressed when Lyn first arrived. “Everyone had gone to New York and Paris,” she says. Around the world, fewer perfume makers were choosing to use costly natural oils in their scents. As the industry leaned more and more on synthetic chemicals, so most of the Grasse fragrance houses, which produced the natural oils, had been sold. The town’s beautiful fields of fragrant flowers, the source of the oils’ raw materials, had also gone. “When I opened my last shop, I was sent one of the very last tuberoses grown in Grasse and I was heartbroken.”

Lyn, however, refused to accept the new consensus. “Because perfume was becoming very synthetic, everyone smelled the same. I didn’t like that. I was told never to use naturals – to smell them for inspiration, but never use them. Naturals were considered too expensive. I rebelled and I said, well the industry was created around naturals, we must still use them.” Later, when she started work as an independent perfumer, this would become her hallmark.

A fter Grasse, Lyn worked with several different British brands, from Boots to The Body Shop to Liberty. She then worked at the French luxury goods corporation LVMH, home to some of the industry’s biggest perfume brands, and became their chief perfumer for 10 years. >

“Because perfume was becoming very synthetic, everyone smelled the same.

was told never to use natural oils –they were considered too expensive. I rebelled.”

Then in 2000 she set up Miller Harris, which quickly became one of the most prestigious fragrance brands in the world. Ten years ago, she sold Miller Harris and in 2015 she launched Perfumer H in Marylebone – a smaller and more personal platform for her talents, releasing five fragrances, twice a year. She lives nearby with Christophe, and their son, Henri.

The Crawford Street shop and laboratory are part of Lyn’s plan to demystify scents. “Perfumery often hides behind this mask. These perfumers are lords, kings! It is true, you do have a magic, but why can’t I share some of my know-how with the world? That’s what happens in Crawford Street. I thought there’s so much mystery, why not show people?”

“ This is me wiser, more grown up,” Lyn says of Perfumer H, “I took all that knowledge and created my new, stripped-back vision. This is about stripping back the industry, taking it back to its roots. When I was in Grasse, everyone was talking about the bottle or the advertising. No-one was interested in the juice, except that it had to sell as well as the last one. There was no creativity, it was very flat – and Grasse became a sad place.”

O ver the past decade, though, a sea change in the industry has started to bring to the market more quality perfumes based on natural ingredients. In part, this is a reaction to the increasing number of people who are developing allergies from the chemical overload of artificially scented products. Research from the University of Melbourne has shown that as many as one in three people suffer health problems from exposure to synthetic fragrances: headaches, asthma, skin allergies, nausea or brain fog.

“ The reason so many people are now allergic to fragrances is because these days everything is scented,” Lyn agrees. “This is one of the things we are trying to do with Perfumer H –to say that having a good quality fragrance is so important. You shouldn’t really be using a powerfully scented washing powder. How can you wear perfume on top of that? I want people to be aware, this isn’t how you should scent your clothes or home or your life. I mean, you can even get scented toilet roll now. It’s horrific. I remember my grandmother smelling of this beautiful fragrance of roses, but she washed

her clothes with a plain soap bar – I want to go back to that.”

By fuelling the growing demand for real, high-quality perfumes, based on natural materials rather than synthetics, Lyn and her peers have caused a heartwarming change: they have brought the fields of flowers back to Grasse. “People like me revitalised it. This new era has come through for the town. Four years ago, I was sitting in the fields in Grasse, at Robertet. The tuberose has come back,” she says with a smile.

“It’s like a reawakening.”

PERFUMER H

19 Chiltern Street, London, W1U 7PQ 106A Crawford Street, W1H 2HZ perfumerh.com

OLFACTORY FARMING BEYOND PERFUMER H, MARYLEBONE IS A HOT SPOT FOR PERFUMES. HERE ARE OUR PICKS FOR CHRISTMAS

LIME DI SICILIA EAU DE PARFUM ORTIGIA

A Classic Sicilian scent created for Ortigia by leading Italian perfumer Lorenzo Villoresi. Rich aromatic lime wood, flowers and oil from the scented lime tree: fresh and young yet complex. ortigiasicilia.com

IMMORTELLE COLOGNE & COTTON

One of the small range of exquisite colognes that give the brand its name: a cool and invigorating blend of mandarin, lemon and orange flower. cologneandcotton.com

FLEUR D’ORANGER 27 LE LABO

A natural orange blossom creation that took more than three years to compose. Fresh floral and lemony notes, rounded out by musk and the succulent, sunny touches of bergamot, petit grain and lemon. lelabofragrances.com

RÊVE DE HANAMI RITUALS

Named after the Hanami celebration that marks the flowering of cherry blossoms in Japan. A delicate bouquet of creamy, rosy florals, enhanced by bright notes of lychee, pear and bergamot. rituals.com

NEW-YORK NICOLAÏ

The signature fragrance of Patricia de Nicolaï, inspired by the city that never sleeps. A spicy, amber eau de toilette with black pepper, clove and patchouli on a citrus start. pnicolai.com

GREY FLANNEL BY GEOFFREY BEENE GREY FLANNEL

A sophisticated, masculine scent based on a blend of lemon, orange, violet, cinnamon and rose, accompanied by woody notes of oak and sandalwood. greyflannel.co.uk

SUNSPEL OAK WOOD SUNSPEL

Made for Sunspel by Lyn Harris. Top notes of bergamot and neroli, fused with English camomile and angelica seed, sit on a base of cedar wood, sandalwood and oak moss, sealed with amber and frankincense. sunspel.com

MARRAKECH AESOP

Inspired by the city of Marrakech, an eau de parfum built on clove, sandalwood and cardamom, celebrating the aromas of spices used in local dishes and the intense colours of the souks. aesop.com

IRENE Marylebone is open!

IRENE is an artisanal bakery and speciality coffee shop.

A must go to if you are after exceptional sourdough bread, pastries, sandwiches and cakes. Everything is hand–made and freshly baked every morning for guests to enjoy in a cozy atmosphere.

Come visit at 82 Bell Street, NW1 6SP www.irenebakery.co.uk irene.bread

Royal Oak Health, Your Local Wellness Expert

British-Made Award Winner Royal Oak Health gives priority to British ingredients and sources the best from all over the world. Unlike many brands, which mainly target older people, we have created a range of products also suitable for the younger generation, especially university students and office workers with busy, fast-paced lives.

Our British-made supplements are available on Amazon, through our website royaloakhealth.co.uk, or in our central London shop at 4 Glentworth Street, NW1 5PG.

Please quote the code ROH22 for a 10% discount online or in store.

We all want our children to succeed, but it’s how that success is defined that can make a school stand out.

At Portland Place School teachers see your child’s potential and set it free. The personalised and nurturing educational environment allows children to become inquisitive, creative and open-minded and to achieve a real-life education beyond just exams.

The result? Our students achieve personally, socially and academically.

Entry in Years 6, 7 and 9. Find out more about how happiness gets results www.portland-place.co.uk or admissions@portland-place.co.uk

Portland Place School, Regents Park.

THE DIFFERENCE MAKERS

Introducing the people behind Marylebone’s vital charities and community organisations: Penny Alexander, chief executive of the Baker Street Quarter Partnership

Interview: Jean-Paul Aubin-Parvu Portraits: Orlando Gili

The Baker Street Quarter Partnership is a not-for-profit body funded and directed by local businesses, but with an agenda that caters to everyone. Our job is to make sure that this area is a really positive place for the whole community – residents, workers and visitors.

We do that in three ways. The first is to make the environment around us clean, safe and welcoming. How do we ensure that it looks after people’s wellbeing? How do we make it as accessible as possible? How do we keep it vibrant and fun? The second is about promoting and supporting

the area to ensure its future vitality. It has done well during the current period of change, but we can’t be complacent. We need to be proactive and keep driving it forward.

T he third way is to nurture a connected and caring community and have a positive social and environmental impact. Our Smarter Giving programme is central to this strand. Our business members really want to make a difference. Smarter Giving is about harnessing their resources and helping them do good in the places where there’s most need.

We focus our efforts on the Lisson Grove and Church Street Ward areas, just north of Marylebone Road. When we launched Smarter Giving 10 years ago, many local businesses had no idea there was an area right on their doorstep that is fantastic but also has some significant social and economic challenges. Corporate giving often has a national or international reach, but meeting a need within your own neighbourhood means you can engage in a more immediate and tangible way. You can make a difference in person.

My colleague Kate Heslegrave heads up the programme and spends her time getting to know the local grassroots charities, community groups and schools, developing those relationships and finding out what support is needed. >

That support can come in any number of forms, including volunteering, mentoring, fundraising, donating goods and services, and offering work experience.

For example, we work with a couple of care homes for older people, and one of our projects is to organise day trips for residents. Local businesses will either fund the trip or have employees coming along as volunteers. We have been to places like Windsor and the seaside, and they’re always a great day out. An accountancy firm, BDO, provides monthly entertainment at one of the care homes, organising bingo, music and other really fun activities.

We work closely with some of the local charity nurseries. One of them had a disused roof garden that needed redoing, so we reached out to one of our building managers. He rallied together his contractors and they went up and did the work, including installing a vegetable garden so that the kids and their families could learn about growing food. We also regularly launch appeals for clothing, food and toys, just getting those out to the people who really need them.

O ver the years we’ve worked on various projects with a women’s hostel. One of my favourites involved Howdens, the kitchen company, whose head office is in the area. We brokered a donation of a fully functioning industrial kitchen for the hostel, which now runs a food enterprise business from that kitchen as both a fundraising platform and a place for women to develop work skills. They’ve sold some of their delicious bakes at our food market, which is lovely for us because we get to sample them!

L ocal businesses sometimes donate goods – for example, hotels donating bedding and crockery through one of the homelessness charities to support people who are setting up their first homes. We sometimes have furniture donated by companies after they refurbish or move premises. This often goes into some of the youth centres. Some of the hotels have been great at running recruitment drives, trying to get local people into local jobs, which is a real passion of ours. It also makes practical sense. A lot of jobs in the hospitality industry require you to work quite late, so it’s actually really helpful if you’re local.

We promote Smarter Giving to our members constantly. The main reason it was set up in the first place was because we had lots of businesses saying that they wanted to contribute but didn’t know where to start. “How do we find these local charities? How do we find where we can make a difference?” Our members still get in touch with us directly, and we also highlight success stories in our newsletter and other communications.

K ate is particularly good at understanding what each business can give that’s of most value. Sometimes it’s money. Sometimes it’s skills. Sometimes it’s goods. Kate will store that information, and when she’s out in the community looking at where the need is, she then reaches

back out to make those links. And if a charity comes to us with a particular need, we notify the business community via our circulation list, then help set everything up. Another key part of Kate’s role is the follow up, making sure that the brokerage is successful and that the relationship is what it needs to be.

The Portman Estate is a founder member of the Baker Street Quarter Partnership. They’ve always been highly responsive to call outs from our Smarter Giving programme and very generous in funding local initiatives. They adopted a local homelessness charity, West London Mission, as their charity partner for three years. They’ve provided funding for playgrounds, a green wall to shield a local school, and day trips for the elderly. Their teams have also volunteered on day trips and wrapped Christmas presents for children in hospital. They are also good at mobilising their contractors to help, including a recent SOS for a handyman from the women’s homelessness shelter, and during the pandemic they helped to get drivers for the food bank.

We were quite overwhelmed with businesses wanting to help during the pandemic. The food bank had to expand massively and start making home deliveries. They needed crates to pack all the food in, and we were able to get the local Co-op to donate some. We then had our waste provider and one of the local electricians delivering the food.

We also had businesses step up to provide stationery and laptops for children who needed them for remote learning. West 1 Physio ran online exercise classes for the elderly from the day centre, which had to close its doors. This was a really important way for them to keep in touch, albeit virtually, while also getting some exercise. We were also able to get some of the property owners to find parking spaces for frontline health workers, while businesses donated wellbeing packs and vouchers to nurses and doctors. And there were huge financial donations made to both the food bank and the St Mungo’s homeless charity during that period.

Smarter Giving has grown beyond our wildest expectations. More and more businesses have got involved and we’ve had 650 volunteers come through the programme. I think it’s essential that businesses make a positive difference to the local area. They have the resources. They can afford to put something back into the community. But there are also self-motivated reasons for them. They need to attract talented staff, and there are lots of people who want to feel attached not only to their job but to their community. That sense of belonging is really important. Everyone benefits. That’s the beauty of this.

SMARTER GIVING

Baker Street Quarter Partnership 64 Baker Street, W1U 7DF bakerstreetq.co.uk

“Our business members want to make a difference. Smarter Giving is about harnessing their resources and helping them do good in the places where there’s most need.”

A CLOSER LOOK

FOOD » 34 STYLE » 42 HOME » 52 WELLBEING » 58 HEALTHCARE » 62

FOOD » 37

FOOD PHILOSOPHY

Lynsey Hallinan of Ginger Pig on working with whole carcasses, visiting abattoirs, and the power of food to spark conversations

STYLE » 42 Q&A

O Pioneers founders Clara Francis and Tania Hindmarch on joyful dressing, ploughing their own furrow and why pockets are feminist

HOME » 56

ANATOMY OF A DESIGN

Robin Maude of Vitsœ on a 60-year-old chair design that was brought up to date by its legendary designer

Q&A: DAISUKE HAYASHI

Roketsu, which opened on New Quebec Street earlier this year, is close to the Platonic ideal of the expression ‘small but perfectly formed’. With just 10 seats, aligned along a wooden counter in a quiet, intimate space laid out in the traditional sukiya architectural style, this is no heaving hub of night-time carousing. The food, too, eschews scale but aspires to perfection. The cuisine is kaiseki – a somewhat ceremonial multi-course experience that sits somewhere between dinner and performance art, built upon exceptional seasonal ingredients, dextrous preparation techniques, and presentation of great beauty and delicacy.

O verseeing it all is Daisuke Hayashi, an acknowledged master of the kaiseki art, who began his training at the age of 18 at Kikunoi restaurant in Kyoto under the watchful eye of the legendary Yoshihiro Murata, a chef whose influence on Japanese high-end cuisine is as vast as his collection of Michelin stars. After moving to London a decade ago and assisting with the opening of several restaurants, including Tokimeite in Mayfair, Daisuke has finally realised his dream of running a restaurant of his own, reproducing his own vision of traditional kaiseki without any pressure to compromise.

Q: W hat is the philosophy behind the kaiseki tradition?

A: K aiseki cuisine is an important part of Japanese culture. It offers seasonal ingredients in a presentation designed to expresses in many ways the seasonality of each time of year. Many traditional Japanese connotations are incorporated into the dishes. We believe that kaiseki allows our guests to experience the breadth of Japanese culture through a meal.

Q: Your roots as a chef are in the city of Kyoto, the heartland of kaiseki dining. How does the history, culture and character of the city influence the food?

The head chef at Roketsu on kaiseki dining, Kyoto, and the importance of quality ingredients

Interview: Mark Riddaway

A: For over 1,000 years, Kyoto was the capital city of Japan. It was the seat of the imperial court, a city where artisans from all over Japan gathered and where the country’s first-class culture and arts became concentrated. Today, Kyoto remains a city that places great importance on preserving the customs of the past, and kaiseki is one of the ways of expressing that heritage. Moreover, the Kyoto area has four distinct seasons, with real variations in temperature and rainfall, and so is rich in seasonal foods.

A: I fell in love with cooking as a child when I went fishing with my father on a weekly basis and cooked the fish that I caught with him.

Q: W hat brought you to London and what were your impressions of the city’s food when you arrived?

A: A fter serving as the head of the Japanese cuisine section at the G20 Summit in Toyako, Hokkaido Japan in 2008, I was given a mission by my master chef at Kikuno, Yoshihiro Murata, to disseminate Japanese cuisine and culture overseas. Ten years ago, when I arrived in London, I felt that Japanese culinary culture in the city was still in its developing phase. Over the past decade, it has changed a great deal.

Q: W hat led you to open Roketsu?

A: A fter coming to the UK, I had always planned to open a restaurant serving authentic kaiseki in London. Over the years, thankfully I had the opportunity to set up several

Japanese restaurants in London and that allowed me to learn a lot about the restaurant industry here. Having learned so much, I thought the time had now come to open a restaurant of my own, through which I could express my own approach to kaiseki.

Q: How important is the quality of the ingredients?

A: Traditional Japanese cuisine is known as a ‘subtractive cuisine’, meaning that – as far as possible – the ingredients should not be modified. Instead, it is important to bring out and respect the best of their natural flavours. In this context, the freshness of the ingredients is absolutely indispensable. Every morning, we receive information on fresh ingredients from farmers and fishermen, and that informs what we serve at the restaurant.

Q: A re there any British ingredients you particularly enjoy cooking with?

Q: W here did your love of food and cooking come from?

“Traditional Japanese cuisine is known as a ‘subtractive cuisine’, meaning that – as far as possible – the ingredients should not be modified. Instead, it is important to bring out and respect the best of their natural flavours.”

A: We buy fish and other seafood products from Cornwall, directly from the fishermen, and we especially like the shellfish. Also, British mineralrich vegetables from local farmers are an essential part of my cooking.

Q: Roketsu is very small and intimate, with diners seated in a line at a counter. Why is that? What is it that you want diners to feel?

A: I t hink of the restaurant as an amusement park, and everything from the tableware to the interior design expresses something of Kyoto. Also, our restaurant is designed in a way that allows us to pay attention to

each and every guest, as thoroughly as possible.

Q: T he interiors were designed and built in Kyoto by the craftsmen of Nakamura Sotoji Komuten, using Japanese hinoki wood, then shipped over here to be assembled. Why go to that effort and expense?

A: We try to disseminate real and authentic Japanese food culture, so it is inevitable that we bring the real thing as much as we can.

ROKETSU

12 New Quebec Street, W1H 7RW roketsu.co.uk

FOOD PHILOSOPHY

GINGER PIG

Lynsey Hallinan, director of operations at Ginger Pig, on working with whole carcasses, the visceral experience of visiting abattoirs, and the power of food to spark conversations

Interview: Ellie Costigan

I heard about Ginger Pig when I was living in Sydney, back in 2009. At the time, there weren’t many people doing things in what I would call the ‘right’ way, who mirrored how I felt about food. Back then, Tim Wilson, our founder, always seemed to be featured in the Guardian or the Observer and I remember thinking, this guy is really down to earth, but really insightful; that’s exactly the sort of person I want to work for. I admired Ginger Pig from afar, then I got them to give me a job – and the rest is history.

Tim is a real foodie – apart from being a meat man, a farmer, he’s a fantastic cook. I think that rubs off on people. If you didn’t love food when you joined Ginger Pig, you’ll love it by the time you leave.

The more I cooked, the more interested I became in provenance. Why does a piece

of chuck from Ginger Pig taste substantially better than a piece of chuck from somewhere else?

And that’s what happens with our customers. We’ve got customers who’ve been coming to us for 25 years who at first would be asking lots of questions; now, they can tell me about farming methods.

Ginger Pig is fuelled by amazing people who believe in what they’re doing and work really hard. It’s a hard job: we’re open seven days a week, it’s sometimes dirty, it’s tough – think of the weight of those carcasses. You’ve got to be a special person to be able to do that.

We do get the odd comment about our products being expensive, but I’ve never had somebody say it wasn’t worth it. When you look at what you’re actually getting for your money, the lack of shrinkage when you

cook it and the quality of the product, it is worth it.

We’re getting better, but as a society we still need to change the way we shop for and eat meat. Flexible diets, eating smaller pieces. That is the foundation of Ginger Pig. It’s what we’ve always been about. I like to bring our managers to abattoirs to reinforce exactly what our responsibilities are. It is a visceral thing to see – and it reminds us why we make sure things are done to a different standard.

We no longer have our own farm, but we deal with other likeminded people who supply us with meat that we think is of good quality, with good animal husbandry. There’s no real secret to it, it’s just about doing things right.

We still butcher all our animals. With the exception of beef, we

get full carcasses in. You must utilise the whole carcass. That’s where our responsibility lies. If you’re French-trimming a rack, that trim needs to go into something else, whether it’s a kofta, our lamb merguez sausages rolls, or our shepherd’s pie in the deli. Everything has got to be used.

We’ve got some diehard customers. When you work in the shop, you become people’s friend. Food generates a lot of conversation.

Marylebone will always be the jewel in the crown for me. It was our first bricks and mortar place. At one stage, Tim lived in the basement and would travel back to Yorkshire to pick up carcasses. It was a leap of faith and a lot of hard work. There was a lot of sacrifice on his part to make that dream happen.

The guys who work in the Marylebone shop have been there for ages. Loretta’s been there for 15 years; Vida, her sister, for around 16. When I go into that shop I get a special feeling, and that’s down to the people behind the counter. You can have the best meat in the country but if you don’t have the right team, none of it matters.

GINGER PIG

8-10 Moxon Street, W1U 4EW thegingerpig.co.uk

A GLASS APART

Gaston Fusco, bar manager at The Churchill Bar & Terrace, on an aromatic Italian red

Interview: Viel Richardson

If I take a look at our current wine list, the Pio Cesare Barolo stands out as one of my personal favourite wines. This red wine is produced in the Piedmont region of northern Italy, made strictly from nebbiolo grapes. It is aromatic with rich tannins and characteristics of old oak and notes of red flowers on the nose. Barolo wines like this are considered by many to be some Italy’s finest. But my journey to loving this wine did not start on the slopes of Piedmont.

I am of mixed Italian and Argentinian heritage and I discovered my love of wine through a drink made from a French grape grown in the Argentine mountains, while sitting in Buenos Aires. I was 16 when my brother bought me a glass of reserve malbec; it was a revelation. It was the moment that I realised there was something truly magical about the world of wine.

It was from Mendoza in Argentina, where you get some of the world’s best malbec. It is a smooth wine with dark fruit flavours like cherry, plum and sometimes violets. It also has a very moderate acidity which makes the younger wines easy to drink. A reserve Malbec like the one my brother bought has been aged in oak barrels, leading to smoother, more complex and more intense flavours. You start getting notes of coffee, chocolate, wood and leather alongside the dark fruit notes.

I think all the experiences that you have in life lead to the choices you make, and while I will not say that one single glass was the reason that I chose this career, it was certainly important. I have always been an outgoing, friendly

person and I love working in hospitality. That day opened my eyes to the joy wine could bring, not only to me but also to my friends and family. I was 17 when I discovered my love of hospitality, so maybe that glass had a part to play in my choice of career.

No w sometimes when serving a customer a wonderful wine like the Pio Cesare Barolo, my memory will take me back to that glass of malbec in Buenos Aires, which changed everything. Maybe a glass of this Italian classic enjoyed in our bar might do the same for someone else.

THE CHURCHILL BAR & TERRACE

Hyatt Regency London –The Churchill 30 Portman Square, W1H 7BH hyatt.com

ANATOMY OF A DISH 30-EGG YOLK TAGLIOLINI, BLACK TRUFFLE, BUTTER, PARMIGIANO REGGIANO

Masha Renner, head chef of Lina Stores, on a simple but luxurious Piedmontese pasta dish

In a nutshell

Our 30-egg yolk tagliolini is a simple but luxurious dish, made of a few ingredients: eggs, parmigiano reggiano, truffle, butter and fresh pasta. These ingredients combine perfectly, resulting in a dish with delicate texture and rich flavour.

The inspiration

‘Tajarin al tartufo’ is a traditional recipe from Piedmont. I happen to have a special connection to this region – it almost feels like a second home to me – and it’s one of the most interesting Italian regions from a culinary perspective. Langhe is a picturesque hilly area of Piedmont, known for its fine red wines such as barolo and barbaresco, for its truffles, and generally for the culture of ‘mangiare bene’, meaning ‘eating well’. At Lina Stores we use black truffle from Umbria to keep the dish affordable at £12, which is very good value for a truffle dish in London.

The purpose

At Lina Stores we want to bring authentic Italian flavours to our customers and educate them about Italy and its traditions. This is one of the dishes that allows us to do so. The ‘tajarin’ – the word for tagliolini in the Piedmontese dialect – were first served as early as the 1500s, made for special occasions.

The technique

To make tagliolini you need flour, eggs and salt. Given the high number of yolks, the dough is very firm and rubbery so you will need a strong pair of arms to work it! If you’d rather skip this step, buy some quality, freshly made long pasta. At Lina Stores, we make different types of pasta every day, which are also available for delivery. Once the tagliolini is ready (2-3 minutes in boiling water), it’s time to prepare the sauce. Use water from the pasta to mix some very thinly grated parmesan until you have a smooth cream, add this to the tagliolini in the pan and toss with a generous amount of butter. Shave on some fresh truffle after you’ve plated up.

LINA STORES

68 Wigmore Street, W1U 2SD linastores.co.uk

BAYLEY & SAGE

Bayley & Sage was founded in 1997 by Jennie Allen, who opened her first store in Wimbledon Village. Jennie’s commitment to selling high-quality fresh foods and offering a friendly, welcoming service has proven hugely – and unsurprisingly –successful. The Marylebone High Street store is Bayley & Sage’s largest so far, with stunning displays of food upstairs and the fantastic addition of a B&S Abode homewares store in the basement, great for gifts and homewares.

NEW

We asked her team to suggest a few highlights from the store for the run up to Christmas. Here is their selection:

Vassout apples and pears

These apples and pears are grown about 60km from Paris by the Vassout family, the oldest family of arborists in Ile-de-France, with orchards established in 1926. Their fruit is visually stunning and of the very highest quality.

Smoked salmon

A rare find: salmon, smoked in London. This exceptional oak-smoked fish comes from the Secret Smokehouse whose

founder, Max, hails from the west coast of Scotland, where he began smoking fish at a young age.

Baklava

Prepared by Arabica, our baklava selection is handmade in the Lebanese style. It offers an irresistible range of crisp, buttery, melt-in-the-mouth pastries, crammed full of nuts and in a variety of shapes.

Comté 24

Our Comté 24 cheese is produced from summer milk and aged in one of the smallest caves in the Jura, at de Vieu-d’Izena, in the heart of a traditional farming

community. Each wheel is turned and maintained by hand, and is released only once it has reached its optimum flavour.

Bayley & Sage panettone

We partner with a Milanese bakery that has been making panettone since 1944. Flavoured with Madagascan vanilla, Sicilian orange peel, Tuscan honey and Toritto almonds, each one takes three days to make, using a sourdough starter created more than 70 years ago.

BAYLEY & SAGE

33-34 Marylebone High Street, W1U 4QD bayley-sage.co.uk

Q&A: CLARA FRANCIS & TANIA HINDMARCH

Interview: Lauren Bravo

Q: Happy third birthday to O Pioneers! How have your first years in business been?

Tania: It feels like we’ve been on a runaway train! Constantly moving. I don’t think we’ve actually yet stopped, stepped back and said: “Wow, look what we’ve done.”

Clara: It’s been so organic. We didn’t have a grand plan at all – other than to make beautiful dresses that we wanted to wear, and make them slowly in the UK. It’s been an enormous learning curve, and there have been many times where we’ve gone: “We don’t have a clue what we’re doing. But how hard can it be?”

Q: Is that where the adventurous name came from?

Clara: We met in a book group when our kids were small, so we wanted something with a literary feel. We found a Walt Whitman poem, which inspired the book O Pioneers! by Willa Cather. I think we felt like battleworn women who had been through a lot of stuff in our lives; it was quite pioneering to be entering this new phase, without much industry experience, in our mid-to-late forties; it felt brave! Then about a year ago I found out that during World War II my grandfather, a German refugee, joined a regiment of the British Army called Pioneers. So that was a perfect kind of synergy.

Tania: There’s also a parallel between that ‘pioneer’ style and our take on seventies-does-Victoriana: nipped-in waists, puffed sleeves, Liberty print. But although the name has roots in America, it’s a very British brand.

Q: W hy do so many London women want to dress like we’re striding across a prairie?

Clara: There’s a power in putting on a beautiful dress. It takes you out of the urban grime. It can really change how you feel and how you face your day. That was certainly true in lockdown, when we were determined to wear our dresses every day.

Tania: There’s a nostalgic romanticism about dresses like ours. I remember

Tania Hindmarch, left, and Clara Francis

as a child I was only allowed to wear dresses for special occasions, they were very much saved ‘for best’. But that feeling of putting on a dress, swishing the skirt and feeling so special in it – we thought, why not feel like that every day, if we can? Not only does it make you feel good, but sometimes when I walk down the street in one of our dresses, I catch people smiling. Though of course that could be for entirely different reasons…

Clara: No! Of course you can wear them to weddings or parties too, but they’re predominantly meant for throwing on in the daytime. It’s weird that people will spend so much money on a going-out frock without flinching, and then barely wear it. Why not invest in a piece of clothing that you can wear and wear?

Tania: Our dresses are all really hardwearing Liberty cotton, they’ve got big pockets, they’re super practical – if you spill something down them you can just chuck them in the wash and then it’s ready to wear again the next day. We’re big proponents of buying less and maximising what you have. Just because you’ve worn something to a wedding, doesn’t mean you can’t wear it the following week to Sainsbury’s, or walking the dog.

Clara: I actually saw a woman walking on Hampstead Heath in one of our dresses with her wellies on, and she stopped me and opened her coat like a flasher and said: “Look! I’m doing it! I’m wearing my dress out.” I loved it.

Q: Not so long ago, ethical fashion was a niche interest – now half of the brands on Oxford Street are claiming to care…

Clara: By their very nature, those giant fashion brands cannot be sustainable. The whole business model is built on new new new, throw it away and buy more. Our dresses are the price they are because that’s how much it costs to make something ethically, locally, keeping your carbon footprint small – but it’s hard for people to

understand that, because we have all been fed the idea that you shouldn’t have to pay very much for clothes.

Tania: Anyone with any sense should be asking how on earth a company can sell an item of clothing for £8. Look at all the work that’s gone into it – how can that happen without someone, somewhere, being exploited? The key difference is that we created and grew O Pioneers with sustainability at the heart. We’re not doing it retroactively.

STYLE PHILOSOPHY

DASHING TWEEDS

Guy Hills, founder of Dashing Tweeds, on colourful Victorians, the qualities of tweed, and the frequent abuse of the word ‘bespoke’

Interview: Ellie Costigan

Everything starts with the fabric. We’re a weave design studio, and we design two fabric collections a year. We sell the fabrics and make clothes to order, either made to measure in a factory or we have a bespoke tailor downstairs.

My background is in fashion photography. About 15 years ago, I was asked to photograph the archives for Savile Row. There were swatches of fabric going back 200 years. You look at the black and white pictures and think Victorians were drab, but they wore really rich colours and there was so much choice for men. Many people today grew up thinking that colourful, fun fashion is for women. That’s changing now. Menswear feels more interesting again.

When I was younger, I bought a lot of vintage Vivienne Westwood – she uses a lot of tweed. I was always cycling round London in a tweed jacket, which got me thinking: tweed is perfect for sportswear. I came up with the idea of combining modern, hightech sportswear with tweed and

Q: Fast fashion is a feminist issue as well as an environmental one. Is that why you work mainly with women-owned businesses?

Tania: The few times we’ve worked with men in the industry haven’t been great experiences. Whereas it’s just such a nice, easy, flowing relationship with all our female suppliers. There’s no patronising, no bullying.

Clara: The fashion industry is so male-dominated at the top – but the majority of makers sitting behind the

Q: So we don’t need to save your dresses for best?

invented a reflective material called Lumatwill. It’s a tweed for London – a kind of urban camouflage.

I grew up around here, on Montagu Street. My father built our family house – he was an architect. I’m from a family of architects. I’m the only one who isn’t.

Early on, we did a big collaboration with Converse, and I filled my room up to the ceiling with the shoes, selling them to all my friends. It was a success, so I decided to sink my life into it and give up photography. I had no idea how to run a business! I got the shop before I knew exactly what I was selling, but I saw the place and set my heart on it. It was completely passion-led.

I wanted the shop to feel like you’re walking into someone’s arty drawing room, with interesting pieces to have conversations around. I’ve got a friend who builds bicycles for Grayson Perry – he built my clothing rail, which is based on Duchamp’s Bicycle Wheel. Some people want to go to a shop, buy something and leave. The people who come in here really invest their time.

British wools are thicker than Australian merino wools. The basic rule is, sheep living in colder, more rugged environments have thicker wool. British wool tweed creates a real rugged texture that people aren’t used to. But I really like it; it’s more interesting and lasts well.

The word ‘bespoke’ is much maligned. You hear a lot of tailors trying to pass off madeto-measure clothes as bespoke. They’re not listening to the customer: the customer should be bespeaking what they want, not “we can make a bespoke suit for you, but it’ll be what we want to make”. I want people to come in here and love our fabrics, then tell us what they want us to do with it.

In the old days, people would be inspired by cloth collections, go to their tailor and say, I want this new fashionable cut, in this fabric. Magazines like Tailor and Cutter would include line drawings of beautiful suits and pattern cuttings of the latest fashion for the tailors. When the magazines went bust, that dialogue between fashionable men and the tailors disappeared. I am trying to re-open that dialogue.

We really like using British wool and working directly with farmers. We were approached by a British sheep farmer, who rears Swaledale Bluefaced Leicester sheep. We watched them being shorn, then took the wool to be spun. The farmer and his wife then helped design a tweed, which was really special.

People think tweed is fuddy duddy and fusty, but it’s a fabric to have fun in. Colour is inherent in the design. If you were to think of one fabric to wear when you’re enjoying yourself, it’s tweed.

DASHING TWEEDS

47 Dorset Street, W1U 7ND dashingtweeds.co.uk

sewing machines are female. Initially our mums did all of the brand’s knitting, and now we employ knitters who are all retired women and they love doing it, feeling like they’re still a part of the world. Also, women understand what women want to wear. You often find dresses that have annoying ties or frou-frou sleeves that dangle down, and they’re just not practical. Backless dresses where you can’t wear a bra. We’re mindful of those details. Like pockets –pockets are a feminist statement!

Q: Each of your pieces has the name of the seamstress written on the label. Why is it so important to know who made our clothes?

Tania: Because without the makers, there are no dresses. We have so much respect for their skills, and they should be acknowledged.

Clara: It’s about understanding that a human being has made every piece of clothing that you’re going to wear. These days we’re all so far removed from the process. It’s like eating meat – people just don’t want to think about

where their clothes have come from.

Tania: Definitely. Not that long ago people would make their own clothes and pass down that knowledge through generations, and we’ve lost that. It’s what we’re trying to get back to, being conscious of the skill involved in making something. We always knew we wanted to work with Liberty fabric, because it stands for

Q: Britain has such a rich textile tradition – but have we stopped valuing handicraft?

quality, heritage and timeless design. You can spot a Liberty print a mile off! And because the quality is so good, we know we’re making forever dresses.

Clara: We’re passionate about bringing traditional crafts into everything we do – we’ve got our knitters, patchworkers, dressmakers, an embroiderer. And they’re all very anti-waste. They will always try to use every scrap of fabric in some way.

Q: L ike fashion’s answer to nose-totail eating?

Clara: Yes! We’re basically using the offal, like St JOHN up the road…

Q: So what brings you to Marylebone? Is this the closest thing to rustic idyll to be found in Zone 1?

Tania: We’re both north London girls, so Marylebone feels right on our doorstep – and we’re just in heaven here. The area is stylish but laidback, with a real bohemian, European feel, and I think one of the reasons is that there’s a mixture of residential buildings and retail. Having locals who actually live here really makes a difference.

Clara : Everyone was so friendly when we moved in. We love Daunt Books, V V Rouleaux, Lina Stores, and Paul Rothe & Son for tea and sarnies. And my cousin is the manager of KJ’s Laundry next door! It’s like Eastenders round here.

Clara: We wanted it to be unashamedly pretty. There’s this idea that with fashion stores that you have to be directional, cuttingedge – but we just wanted it to feel authentically us. It’s not like we had any investment; it’s purely what we could do with our imaginations and the budget we had. So we called in favours, we found the glass counter on Facebook Marketplace, borrowed our pink sofa from a friend who has a vintage interiors business, I made the pom-poms… it was all a bit of a hodgepodge, but it feels like an extension of home.

Q: A nd is that you two we spy in the photos on the wall?

Tania: People might think: “Oh my god, who do these women think they are? Why are they in all the photos?”

But it was a necessity when we first started out, because we had no money for models! Then as we grew, we realised that seeing us in the dresses really resonated with our customers.

Clara: There are so many women our age who don’t feel they can wear floral dresses, or short dresses, and it’s like: who says you can’t? We’re redefining what it is to be a woman in her forties or fifties. Because we’re visibly doing it, it gives others the confidence to try.

Q: So what’s next? How does a slow fashion brand make sure it grows in the right direction?

Clara: We’re working on our reversible quilted jerkin jacket, and we’re also making a bag in collaboration with a female woodcarver – not easy to find!

Tania: And we’ve got a new collection launching soon on Net-a-Porter. Which, it’s really important to say, is all still made through our same female-led, UK manufacturers, using the same processes we always have. We’re still small and we still do everything our own way.

O PIONEERS

76 Marylebone Lane, W1U 2PR opioneers.co.uk

THE LOOK

BREAKING OUT

Flora Macdonald Johnston, fashion & content director of KOIBIRD, on a boundarypushing aesthetic for a postCovid world

Q: How do you want people to feel when they step inside the shop?

What invisible line divides sexy from vulgar? Bold and powerful from brash and arrogant? Is a line even there? As we discovered more brands for our AW22 collection, and dived deeper into designers’ collections, we found that many of them were thinking about these questions as they created clothing and accessories for a post-Covid world. Loosely inspired by the film Death Becomes Her, we came up with a theme for the collection: Sex Becomes Her. Clever, right?! Our new season embraces women who embrace themselves and enjoy pushing their sartorial boundaries. This is the kind of edge we appreciate here at KOIBIRD.

One of my favourite looks from the campaign shoot is our Poster Girl Janice bodysuit, styled with our sparkling Gedebe sock boot. Both the outfit itself and the glass tank that dominates the image feed perfectly into that theme of breaking all the rules. And London-based cool girl label Poster Girl is having a serious moment at present. There’s a reason every influencer donned their designs during the September show season. The founders are all about clothing that makes a statement and empowers the wearer. You don’t have to be a certain sex or body type to enjoy their designs. Not one to shy away from a cut-out, the stretchy Janice jumpsuit

(crafted from nylon and spandex) has them featured down its front, complete with cute heart buttons. It feels fresh, celebrating the notion that you can be entirely covered while you bare all.

Even if uncertain, this is an exciting time for the fashion industry. It’s a chance for designers to shake off the shackles of what was once appropriate because our world is now constantly changing in ways we cannot control. And with that in mind, why not have a little fun?

KOIBIRD 62 Marylebone Lane, W1U 2PB koibird.com

WINTER HATS

Winter brings many dreary things, but it does come with its fair share of consolation prizes. Foremost among these are pies, fireworks and fairy lights – but snug woolly hats are definitely in the top five, and Marylebone boasts some of the best. We’re big believers in beanies, and if the beanie comes with a furry bobble, so much the better. Yet there’s plenty more to explore in the headgear world, from berets to baker boys to a winter-style bucket hat. There really is a hat for every head.

3.

1. HARRIS TWEED BUCKET HAT

Brora, £149 broraonline.com

For those who believe bucket hats are for life, not just for summer 2022, this Harris tweed number will fit all your needs. Woven exclusively for Brora on the isle of Harris in the Outer Hebrides, it’ll pair as perfectly with dungarees and an oversized cardi as it will with Brora’s matching trousers and coat.

2. ROBY HAT

Agnès b, £95 agnesb.co.uk

Made from 100% wool, this black-as-night Roby hat succeeds in making its wearer look both very cool and very warm at the same time. Don’t be deceived by the clearly defined structure; the wool is soft and welcoming, and with multiple sizes available you can be sure to find the right fit.

3. EXTREME CASHMERE BEANIE

Mouki Mou, £130 moukimou.com

There’s nothing basic about this beanie, with its soft, ribbed cashmere and casual turn-up cuff. Extreme Cashmere is a brand based in Amsterdam, and their cashmere is indeed extremely soft. It also extremely enduring, and accessible, having been explicitly designed to be for “everybody and every body”.

NEW ARRIVAL

Isabel Manns

Not so much new as (befitting of a womenswear designer who puts sustainability first) recycled. Isabel Manns, who enjoyed a successful pop-up on Marylebone High Street, has now popped up again on New Quebec Street, to the delight of her local following. Many of Isabel’s clothes are reversible, essentially creating two outfits from each purchase. She produces seasonless collections, each designed to complement the last. The clothes are designed in a way that minimises waste and manufactured in England using fabrics derived from eco-friendly sources.

ISABEL MANNS

18 New Quebec Street, W1H 7RQ isabelmanns.com

WINTER WARDROBE

THE EDIT

5 OCTOBRE SAM BRACELET KJ’S LAUNDRY, £100 kjslaundry.com

CRUSHED VELVET TIERED MAXI DRESS & BELT ME & EM, £350 meandem.com

LEATHER BELT WITH SWIRL PANEL PAUL SMITH, £160 paulsmith.com

VELVET BIANCA JACKET BELLA FREUD, £790 bellafreud.com

UPTOWN SACK AVIATOR GLITTER TISSA FONTANEDA, £1,400 tissafontaneda.com

RAILS PERCI SWEATER IN MULTI STARS TRILOGY, £230 trilogystores.co.uk

PETAL POWER

Loic, the shop manager at Grandirosa, on peeled roses, Christmas wreathes and the joy of working with flowers

Interview: Emily Jupp

The newest addition to Chiltern Street is a beautiful new florist called Grandirosa. The team here create artistic bouquets for delivery in London, as well as floral design for private homes, luxury events and weddings, and full-scale installations. They supply hotels and clubs like the Ned, Soho House Annabel’s with flower arrangements. They also provide floral installations for fashion labels, such as Erdem and Burberry. In 2019 their ‘under the sea’-themed sustainable display for Chelsea Flower Show on behalf of John Lewis and Edinburgh Gin won both a Gold Award and the 2019 People’s Champion Award. So, they’re certainly making waves. Fortunately, for the average Marylebonite, you can also pop into the shop and buy a bouquet or even a single stem.

Friends Gillian ‘Lil’ Caldwell and Mary Wood started the business six years ago. Mary had worked in

marketing for Cancer Research UK, while Lil had been a lawyer at Freshfields for 10 years. They started with a small studio in Hackney, east London, then opened this beautiful space in Marylebone in late September this year, just in time for Christmas. Loic, the shop manager at Grandirosa offers his tips for the season.

Q: Tell us about yourself, Loic. Have you always worked with flowers?

A: I’ve been a florist for 12 years and worked for Grandi for a year. When Lil and Mary said they were opening the shop in Marylebone they decided I would look after it three days a week.

Q: W hat is it that appeals to you about working with flowers?

A: It’s very seasonal and it never gets boring because you always have different things to use and experiment with. Today, I was working on all the in-house flower

arrangements for the Ned hotel, and the team downstairs are working on private events, so it’s been a big day.

Q: How are you finding your new neighbourhood?

A: Chiltern Street is such a lovely street. The people are friendly and it feels very relaxed here. We’ve already started to get a couple of regular customers, but we need to let more people discover what we do. Our work is quite structural and different. All the roses arrive and we peel back the petals one by one by hand.

Q: They are very distinctive – frilly but somehow also sculptural, like an upside-down wedding dress…

A: That is our signature style, the peeled-back rose. We have red roses and lots of dark pinks for Christmas.

part from your roses, what else do you have in store for Christmas?

A: We keep everything quite seasonal, apart from the roses, which we sell year-round. We’ll have lots of berries; there’s one called ilex, which is a very classic, bright-red berry. Peppercorns, which come in pink or white, also work really well in winter garlands.

We plan to sell wreaths, which will be made here – you can ask for specific items or colours in the wreaths. We use a certain type of eucalyptus and all sorts of pines in our wreaths, which gradually dry out over a month and the smell gets really lovely. We will also offer pine cones and dried orange slices, berries and cinnamon. Simple and classic. We have a small range of baubles and decorations too.

Q: W hat about Christmas trees?

A: We won’t have them in store to pick up but if someone wants a Christmas tree to be decorated and delivered to their house, we can do that for them.

GRANDIROSA

36 Chiltern Street, W1U 7QL grandirosa.com

“Nobody understood my eyes more than Moorfields.”

Glasses and contact lenses didn’t fit into Evgeniya’s active lifestyle, leading her to feel she was missing out. After laser surgery, she’s not missing out anymore.

“I have worn glasses ever since I was in high school, before switching to contact lenses due to my active lifestyle. But contact lenses gave me dry eyes and glasses weren’t practical for me - I wanted to be able to see better when going about my daily life.

I spoke to a number of companies offering vision correction but, due to an issue with my cornea, I didn’t feel comfortable having the procedure with them.

Then I went to see Moorfields Private.

They were able to assess my eyes and find a solution I feel I would not have found anywhere else.

My surgery has improved my quality of life incredibly. I enjoy my daily activities more and I no longer feel like I am missing out on life. I feel a lot safer, especially when driving, as it’s improved my peripheral vision. I don’t remember ever being able to see as well in my life. I wish I’d done it sooner.”

Our world leading consultants and nursing teams provide outstanding patient care, diagnostic and refractive procedures in the state-of-the-art facilities.

Moorfields Private New Cavendish Street Expert eye treatment in the heart of London’s medical district

GIFT GUIDE

A small selection of Christmas gifts from Marylebone’s many magnificent shops

COMPUTER MAT

VEGAN, NO-NASTIES NAIL POLISH LONDON GRACE, £12 londongrace.co.uk

EAGLE HOUSE DAMASK WOAD CUSHION, ENGLISH HERITAGE COLLECTION DESIGNERS GUILD, £68 designersguild.com

CHARLOTTE BOURRUS CITY GLOBES

THE CONRAN SHOP, £185-£595 conranshop.co.uk

LAMBSWOOL SCARF DASHING TWEEDS, £120 dashingtweeds.co.uk

HAY CANDLE PERFUMER H, £155 perfumerh.com

COLORAL

GROOVED BREADBOARD DAVID MELLOR, £68 davidmellordesign.com

WATER BOTTLE LABOUR AND WAIT, £38 labourandwait.co.uk

CASHMERE SLOUCHY HAT BRORA, £105 broraonline.com

6 X JAPANESE VEGETABLE AND HERB SEEDS NIWAKI, £18 niwaki.com

WOMEN’S SHEARLING BABAS SABAH, £185 uk.sabah.am

LIZ VIDAL ABSTRACT CUP TOAST, £28 toa.st

SHOYEIDO OWL INCENSE BURNER TRUNK, £30 trunkclothiers.com

WASHBAG SUNSPEL, £175 sunspel.com

LARGE ZIP-AROUND WALLET PAUL SMITH, £295 paulsmith.com

HOURGLASS AMBIENT LIGHTING EDIT – UNLOCKED, TIGER PALETTE SPACE NK, £78 spacenk.com

6 X LUXURY TRADITIONAL CHRISTMAS CRACKERS

MARGARET DABBS, £66 margaretdabbs.co.uk

CHILTERN SUNGLASSES MONC, £280 monclondon.com

CASHMERE BED SOCKS THE WHITE COMPANY, £36 thewhitecompany.com

MANOUSOS

CERAMIC POMEGRANATE MOUKI MOU, £50 moukimou.com

ONYX BEADED BRACELET MEJURI, £88 mejuri.com

KIYANA BAG

TIGER OF SWEDEN, £349 tigerofsweden.com

CASHMERE GLOVES WOLFORD, £130 wolfordshop.co.uk

CERAMICS HANDMADE

ANATOMY OF A DESIGN

VITSΠ620 CHAIR SYSTEM

Robin Maude, head planner at Vitsœ Marylebone, on a 60-year-old chair design that was brought up to date by its legendary designer

Interview: Viel Richardson

Requirement

When he first started thinking about the 620 Chair System, Dieter Rams’ aim was to design a chair that was robust, comfortable, used minimal materials and embraced the most advanced manufacturing technologies of the time. Most importantly, he wanted a chair that would outlive the person who bought it. The 620 Chair represented a furniture design concept born on the back of the post-Second World War building boom that was really getting into its stride in the late 50s and early 60s. Architects and designers were having to rehouse a continent by replacing an old and damaged housing stock.

Inspiration

After 50 years, while the core of the design remained sound, there was a thought that some of

the elements of the chair needed to be re-evaluated. The ethos of Vitsœ design is one of constant evolution – to continue making the best products we can – and the chair is no different. Around 2013 there was a feeling that the 620 Chair System had drifted a bit from the path it had set out on. The decision was made to invite Dieter back to take a fresh look at every aspect of every component in the chair as it was then and measure it against the original design concept, taking into account the advances in materials and techniques. One of the key things was to make it easier for the consumer – the human being the chair was ultimately designed for – to use the chair. Central to that was an attempt to make what was a heavy chair significantly lighter without compromising performance.

Process

It wasn’t simply a case of Dieter sitting at a design station. Vitsœ installers go to our customers’ homes to assemble and often reconfigure chairs that are decades old, so they have an intimate knowledge about how the chairs fare once they’ve left the shop. Their input about their own and the customers’ experiences was absolutely critical.

The approach was to never make an assumption, to question every design choice, even the ones that seemed obvious. Maybe the answer is what you already think it is, but it has to prove itself. With several components, we went through the evaluation process and decided they didn’t need changing, which is testament to the original design, but others needed to be rethought. Some

changes that had a really positive impact were visible, others were very simple and subtle. Good ideas don’t have to be newfangled or complicated. Every decision was also made with the fundamental ethos of backwards compatibility. We want this to be the best chair it can be, while still respecting those customers who have had the chair for decades.

Materials

Sustainability was always an important part of the design, but it is even more so now. One of the new materials we introduced was coir, which is made from coconut husk. We blended it with a natural latex to create a material for the cushion, which we formed into a shape that adheres perfectly to the chair. This is not the easiest thing to get right because they are both natural materials and they don’t

always behave the way you want them to. It is extremely comfortable, very hardwearing and much more sustainable than the old polymer-based foams.

T he shell is still plastic – and we know that there are problems with plastic. While we consider this to be a single-use plastic that will last a lifetime, it would be nice to find an alternative material that’s as durable and as flexible but isn’t solely reliant on the petrochemical industry. As yet, that technology is not there, but I’m sure in five to 10 years’ time, the shell will be made of a different material.

Philosophy

A common problem with industrial design projects is the pressure for design decisions to be driven by cost. It can be easy to forget about what the

original intentions were. Dieter had a robust and rigid way of thinking that was centred around the person using the chair. Everything needed to be accounted for, to explain itself, to show how it made it easier for a human being to interact with the product. Yes, the Vitsœ 620 Chair System has a design language of its own, but every aspect of that language is rooted in practicality. No design choice can undermine the interaction of the chair and the person. That simple idea of making the chair lighter was actually very difficult to achieve, but it benefits anyone who buys a chair and wants to carry it with them through the rest of their life. That was always the Dieter Rams intention.

VITSŒ

21 Marylebone Lane, W1U 2NG vitsoe.com

IN THE ROUND

Jon Denoris of Club 51

Intelligent Fitness on why getting clients moving is just part of a more rounded and personalised approach to coaching

Q: How would you characterise your approach at Club 51?

A: Club 51 isn’t about our team, it’s about how our team can empower our clients. We’re a vehicle that can take you from where you are now to where you want to be. We’re movementfirst, in that we help people move optimally and give them structure and consistency to train for life, but we also offer performance-based nutrition and coaching advice in other areas of their life – for example, increasing vitality and restoration. Sleep is another area we’re finding ourselves more and more involved in. We’re getting a lot of clients asking us for coaching around sleep. I think that’s probably a sign of the times we’re living through.

Q: W hat is the impact of poor sleep?

A: Sleep is like a master switch. For example, if someone is trying to lose weight, it’s really hard to do that if you’re not sleeping well. It affects your energy and vitality too. We end up looking at the whole circadian rhythm with a client, where you put

the exercise in, what you do with nutrition, what you do with recovery and restoration. We’re looking to find ways of bringing balance to their entire lifestyle.

Everything is connected. In the same way that the connection between coach and client is vital, so is the understanding of each area of our clients’ wellbeing. Sleep connects to mental wellbeing; mental wellbeing connect to fitness; fitness connects to nutrition; nutrition connects to sleep. Understanding the grey areas between these interactions is the key that yields long-term results.

could stay the same. That could be due to their hormone profile, their gut function, a whole range of things. We will drill into the detail and look to get a complete picture of that individual.

Q: Is getting to know people on that intimate level something you enjoy?

A: C ompletely. Ours is an entirely individualised approach. It’s been shown now that you can put three people on the same diet, the exact same macronutrient breakdown, the same number of calories, and one could put on weight, one could lose weight, and the third one’s weight

A: It’s one of the best parts of the job. I still get the same buzz out of that initial consultation. I can see straight away a handful of things that I can show you that are going to make your life so much better. I’m thinking, oh my god, you’re going to feel so much better. You need that individual coaching relationship. You have to establish trust before people will really open up. Then you can start getting to the goals. Then you start getting to the goals behind the goals.

A: Oh, I think it’s vital. Otherwise, it’s like starting a business without a business plan. I know it’s become quite a cliché now – what’s your why?

Q: Does the complexion of those grey areas vary from person to person?

Q: Is having defined goals important?

“Sleep connects to mental wellbeing; mental wellbeing connect to fitness; fitness connects to nutrition; nutrition connects to sleep. Understanding the grey areas between these interactions is the key that yields long-term results.”

well. I’m trying to get more medics to refer – whether it’s cancer, long Covid, metabolic medicine, heart problems, diabetes, obesity. I think a lot of medics are a bit scared to refer to fitness professionals because they’re not sure what it’s going to involve. They’d rather say: “Here’s a sheet of paper, now go and walk three or four times a week.”

We know we can do much better than that. We’ve seen the results.

Q: T here’s a lot of innovation in the world of diet and exercise, but a lot of quackery too. How do you distinguish between the two?

exercise, strength and conditioning, just started a PhD. That’s the starting point – you won’t get to see me unless you’ve got all the top-level certifications. But then it’s about, are you a natural helper? If you’re a coach, you have to be someone who naturally wants to help and has the rapportbuilding skills to make it work. There’s lots of science to coaching, but it’s also an art. You can have all the knowledge, but if a client doesn’t trust you, if they don’t believe you, then it’s hard to move forward. You’ve either got it or you haven’t. I can normally spot it within five minutes.

– but when you find that goal, what you’re doing becomes more than just a transactional trainer-client relationship. That’s where the magic happens. If all you want to do is come in and work with a trainer, do your slot twice a week and off you go, with no deeper aim in mind, there’s nothing wrong with that. But I’m passionate about coaching, and I think coaching is the way forward, in all fields. To coach someone is a different thing to training them. It’s far more involved, far more focussed, and the benefits last for longer. As a coach, I’m really being paid for my thinking time.

Q: You work with some of the clinics in the Harley Street Medical Area. What is it you do?

A: Before I was here, I was at Princess Grace Hospital. It was the first ever private gym within a private hospital in the UK, I think. Exercise is one of the best forms of medicine. It can’t solve everything, of course, but it lowers your risk of so many different things, and it’s important for recovery as

A: I love looking at new stuff that’s coming through, be that a supplement or technology or a way of training, but we have an evidence-informed approach. I follow the evidence, I read the research, I study. It’s good to have a healthy scepticism towards new things, but that doesn’t mean you shouldn’t try stuff that seems plausible and promising. You develop your own protocols, you track things properly and you see what’s working on a daily, weekly, monthly basis. My approach has always been to say: this is what I believe right now, based on the evidence that I’ve seen and understood. The science evolves, you know, and you should evolve with it.

S everal years ago, I was very interested in the genetics and exercise space, but I pressed pause on it because at that time I was unhappy about some of the claims that were being made. Now I’m thinking about getting back into it, because that whole area has really evolved. I think now we might be able to offer some genuine insight, particularly around diet. If there are two or three gene polymorphisms that will influence what your dietary intake should be, then you should be able to start adapting that alongside the epigenetic stuff – the lifestyle element.

Q: W hen you’re recruiting someone to come and work at Club 51, what qualities are you looking for?

A: So, we’ve just taken a new coach on. First-class honours degree in

Q: How much has your world changed since the pandemic?

A: More people are understanding that their health and fitness is something they need to take ownership of. A lot of people came to a realisation that we’re not invincible, myself included. Another new thing is that local companies have been asking us to come and work with their teams: maybe a workshop on energy, or how to sleep better, or how to fit exercise into your schedule. We’ve been delivering yoga classes and boxing classes. More and more employers are seeing that they have a role to play in the wellbeing of their staff, and it might help them attract and retain employees.

From a practical point of view, businesses that are thriving in health and fitness are the ones that can offer more of a hybrid solution and be everywhere for their clients, whenever they want us. Some only want to train in real life, some only want to see us digitally, but where the majority of clients are is that hybrid solution: you’re going to see us twice a week in real life, but in the third session you’re going to do it from your house or wherever, on Zoom. The good thing is that clients are finding a way to keep that continuity and consistency going in a way which they might not have entertained prior to Covid.

CLUB 51 INTELLIGENT FITNESS

51 New Cavendish Street, W1G 9TG clubfiftyone.co.uk

Tracksmith

In a sportwear world dominated by a handful of vast multinational behemoths whose mass-produced apparel has seeped into every crevice of modern life, worn throughout the day for every conceivable activity, Tracksmith does something so straightforward in its focus as to be bafflingly rare: makes running gear for runners. Based in New England, the sport’s US heartland

(the brand’s first store opened at a spot exactly halfway round the Boston Marathon route), it was created by and for nonprofessionals athletes who are committed to training and racing and want to wear high-quality, functional kit that will help them perform. It celebrates the fact that running, whether on the road or the track, is the most accessible, diverse and meritocratic of pursuits, and that, for those who pursue

it, is an incredible boon to both physical and mental health. Now Tracksmith has arrived in London, another historic marathon city, to open its first store outside of the United States. It’s time to lengthen your stride and race down to Chilern Street.

TRACKSMITH 25 Chiltern Street, W1U 7PJ tracksmith.com

COLD COMFORT

Mr Jonathan Joseph, consultant ENT surgeon at The London Clinic, on a cryogenic treatment for chronic rhinitis

Interview: Viel Richardson

because of the pooling of blood. So the patient feels blocked and turns over, then the right side blocks up. This can severely disrupt sleep. The other symptom, a constant discharge, is normally a watery, clear fluid which comes from both sides of the nose, usually in fairly equal amounts. It can also go down the throat in what we call post-nasal drip. If there’s allergy involved, people get fits of sneezing and itching as well.

Q: W hat does the lining of the nose do and why does it then goes wrong?

Q: W hat are the traditional treatments?

Q: W hat is chronic rhinitis?

A: It’s a condition that causes inflammation of the lining of the nose. People are quite aware of allergic rhinitis such as hay fever, which are forms of chronic rhinitis, but there’s a huge number of nonallergic causes. Some people are sensitive to stimuli like changes in temperature, extremes of temperature or the wind. Others react to the smell of perfume. Then there are occupational causes such as chemicals, very dusty environments, or the freezer section of shops.

Q: W hat symptoms does it cause?

A: T he most common symptoms are nasal blockage and discharge. A sufferer’s nose will get very blocked – it’s often particularly bad when patients go to bed, and they often say it alternates from side to side. That’s caused by two things. There’s the normal nasal cycle where one side swells up, then around six hours later that eases and the other side swells. Most of us don’t notice this. But it is also positional. If you lie on your left side, the left nostril will block up more

A: T he function of the nose is to breathe in air and modify it before it reaches your lungs. The air needs to be filtered, humidified and warmed before reaching the lungs. The nose produces mucus to help with that process and also propel away infections. There is a system called the mucociliary escalator, through which the lining and tiny hairs create the mucus and waft it out. This creates a constant circulation of fluid, which maintains good conditions, reduces infection and keeps things functioning normally. When someone’s nose dysfunctions, it produces too much mucus, or the lining becomes thickened. This is what causes the symptoms.

Q: I f it’s just left, can it develop into something more serious?

A: For the vast majority of people it will simply persist. One of the ways we measure its severity is the impact on quality of life. How much does it affect your sleep? How much does it affect your ability to exercise and function. Chronic rhinitis can have a profound effect on these. Some people say, it’s just a blocked nose or drippy nose, get over it, but if you can’t sleep you can’t function. It can also cause severe loss of smell. There are very rare times where it can be the sign of a more significant underlying pathology. So if something doesn’t look quite right and if the symptoms consistently only affect one rather than both sides, we might do some further investigation.

A: We always first talk about conservative measures and treatments. If there’s an allergy, try to avoid the allergen where possible. You can’t completely get rid of dust, but measures like hypoallergenic pillows, mattress protectors and cleaning the dust away where you can do help. In the hay fever season you can take antihistamines. Saltwater rinses for the nose – what we call ‘saline douching’ – flushes the nose and while it is not sexy it can be surprisingly effective. In fact, saltwater rinses are very good for anyone with any nasal problem, generally speaking. Then there are the more medical treatments, such as anti-inflammatory steroid sprays for the congestion. Some people worry about taking steroids long term, but most of the ones we use stay in the nose with close to zero absorption into the wider system. Sometimes we will add in an antihistamine for allergy-related problems. For a drippy nose we prescribe ipratropium bromide, which is muscarinic receptor antagonist. The muscarinic receptors stimulate the nose to produce mucus. Ipratropium bromide switches off the stimulation of those mucus-producing cells.

Q: W hat are the side effects of these treatments?

A: T he most common one is minor nosebleeds, the kind where you blow your nose and there’s blood on the tissue. Usually these stop if you pause the medication for a week or two. Sometimes people find that after a while the spray starts to irritate them causing some reaction in the lining of the nose; again, a short break usually solves this. There are one or two rarer issues worth mentioning. There’s a condition called glaucoma, caused by increased eye pressure. In some rare cases some steroids can increase this pressure, so you have to use steroids with caution. There’s also a very specific issue where certain HIV medication will mean that the

normally tiny amount of steroids that the body absorbs is massively amplified. The HIV drug switches off the enzyme that metabolises the steroids, so they stay in your body and build up over time. Very rare but worth being aware of.

Q: W hat is ClariFix?

A: It is a cryotherapy device. Cryotherapy is any treatment where the active treatment is delivered by freezing or near-freezing temperatures. ClariFix it is designed to deliver that cryotherapy very accurately to the right part of the nose.

Q: How does it work?

A: For both a drippy nose and nasal congestion, a lot of the problem is nerve related. A nerve, the vidian nerve, stimulates cells within the lining to produce mucus and to swell up, leading to the patient’s nasal symptoms. All the medications that we give during the standard treatments act on the final part of that stimulation process. If you cut the nerve, you can prevent the cause of the stimulation upstream.

T here is an operation called a vidian neurectomy that cuts the main trunk of the nerve far back in the nose. The vidian nerve stimulates lubrication of the eye as well as the nose, so you have to warn the patient that they might suffer dryness of the eye after the procedure. There is a branch of the vidian nerve that heads off specifically to the nose, but it’s an extremely fine nerve that can be very, very hard to see. There are procedures for cutting it, but they are not easy to do.

W ith ClariFix, performing a similar procedure really is very simple. First you numb the area with anaesthetic spray then add a decongestant to reduce any swelling. You then anaesthetise the relevant parts of the nose before adding some dressings in the nose to help decongest it further. You place the device in the position where you would cut the nerve, you turn it on, leave it for 30 seconds, and it destroys

“With ClariFix, performing the procedure really is very simple. The great thing is that it doesn’t destroy the vessels nearby, so you’re not compromising the general blood supply to that area.”

the target tissue, thereby severing the nerve. After that, you wait 45 seconds for it to thaw before removing the device from the nose. The great thing is that it doesn’t destroy the vessels nearby, so you’re not compromising the general blood supply to that area.

Q: Is the improvement in

symptoms instant?

A: No, it can take around six weeks to see conclusive results, for a couple of reasons. While the operation itself is not unpleasant, the area can become a bit painful, sore and crusted in the following days. It is a bit uncomfortable for the patient, but nothing that isn’t manageable. You have to wait for any inflammation to settle down, and that can take two to three weeks. Some people’s noses take longer, but by six weeks everyone’s nose should have completely recovered, and you are then able to determine the difference the operation has made.

Q: How effective is it in relation to the more traditional treatments?

A: T hat’s a difficult question to answer because the patients who undergo this are the difficult cases where the patient has not responded to the standard treatment. In a way, as it is a surgical intervention, you want it to be at least as good as the medication, if not better. It’s not an either-or scenario, though, more of an extra tool we have available if others haven’t worked.

Q: How long does the effect last?

A: We are still really assessing that. There is a possibility that the nerve will regenerate and start the process again, but we are looking at years of relief from symptoms. The good thing is the procedure can be repeated with no adverse effects, so if it is necessary for some patients to have the procedure again, there will be no issue in doing so.

Q: A re there reasons why you would say to a patient, I’m sorry this isn’t for you?

A: I f they haven’t tried the standard treatments, I would always suggest those first, because for most people they work well. I then examine their nose. What I’m looking for is, do they have a very deviated septum?

If it’s very bent, I can’t easily access the area I need to, so would need to address that. Also a badly deviated septum might be the actual cause of their symptoms, so we would need another approach to fix the problem. Do they have sinusitis, or are there polyps present? If it’s one of those rare conditions, their symptoms might be a sign of an underlying issue. These would be reasons to at least consider things carefully first. But these are not common issues, and from my experience ClariFix is a procedure that is definitely available to the vast majority of patients.

THE LONDON CLINIC 20 Devonshire Place, W1G 6BW thelondonclinic.co.uk/mj

NEW KID ON THE BLOCK

Kate Farrow, director

of operations at King Edward VII’s Hospital, on the hospital’s newly opened, state-of-the-art outpatient medical centre

Interview: Ellie Costigan

Tucked away discreetly on Beaumont street, across from the main hospital, sits our cutting-edge diagnostic and outpatient centre, the King Edward VII’s Medical Centre. We were very excited to welcome our first patients to this new facility in January this year.

A s an operations director, it’s natural to prime yourself for all the things that might go wrong, especially since we opted for a fullscale opening rather than the softer phased opening that you might normally expect of a facility of this scale and complexity. We chose this approach due to staffing and equipment limitations, but those terrible phone calls never arrived, and I think that was down to our careful planning. We had an excellent in-house team that worked alongside a professional project team, and they looked at every operational and clinical aspect in detail. We started to plan the operational opening of the centre six months in advance, so by January everyone was familiar with the building and ready to go.

O f course, there were hiccups along the way, such as moving the location of our mammography equipment and so having to reinforce the floor, but these were all identified and rectified prior to opening. There were also delays due to COVID. Because of the restrictions, everyone had to socially distance, meaning

“Each floor is dedicated to a different speciality, which has allowed us to equip, orientate and stock the rooms with the specific requirements of each service in mind.”

fewer people could be on site, which naturally slowed things down. However, as we got through the worst of the pandemic, we were able to get back to full speed again.

We treat patients from all over the world, and even COVID did not put a stop to that. We switched from inperson to virtual consultations, which worked well, but we are back to inperson appointments and expect to welcome upwards of 45,000 patients this year.

T he new centre has increased our outpatient provision and enabled us to expand our clinical services. Each floor is dedicated to a different speciality, which has allowed us to equip, orientate and stock the rooms with the specific requirements of each service in mind. This allows us to work more efficiently. Having the majority of our outpatient services under one roof also means that consultants don’t have to send patients across the road for consultations or services, which greatly improves the patient experience.

C oming out of the pandemic and being able to open such a stunning facility has really boosted staff morale –our staff feel proud to work here and to have been part of the transformation. Many of the improvements and efficiencies have been a direct result of careful engagement with consultants, staff and patients.

It is such a spacious, lovely building that our patients feel very welcome and safe in. It’s comfortable: King Edward VII’s Hospital is known for making patients feel welcome – that’s something we’re very proud of – and we have always had a great reputation in terms of our expertise and the service we offer, but we now have a beautiful new building to support the outstanding care we provide. Private patients do tend to follow their consultants, but as an organisation we are lucky to have such patient loyalty, often having patients refer family members and friends.

Our new centre will enable us to further drive innovation and expand and develop existing services. The next phase of redevelopment will be in the main hospital, where we have already built a brand-new operating theatre. It has been a busy few years, but we have more exciting plans ahead.

KING EDWARD VII’S MEDICAL CENTRE 54 Beaumont Street, W1G 6DW kingedwardvii.co.uk

Stop living with pain and get back to living life

Bespoke

private healthcare tailored

Rated Excellent on Doctify

Nestled in the heart of Marylebone, King Edward VII’s Hospital is here to help you on the journey back to health.

From diagnostics at our brand-new dedicated outpatient centre, to treatment from world-class consultants and follow ups with highly-trained physiotherapists, you’ll receive seamless care tailored for you.

Find out more about receiving private treatment at a time that suits you at kingedwardvii.co.uk or speak to our friendly team on 020 3991 1182.

42 Upper Berkeley Street London W1H 5QL

Portman Square, Marylebone W1H

Guide Price: £2,150,000 Sole Agent

Jaffray Estates are excited to launch for sale this stunning newly refurbished two bedroom property located on the second floor of a popular purpose built block in Portman Square.

With low energy LED lighting thoughout, a bio ethanol fireplace and Three Zone Sonos and Bose surround sound system in the living room, each bedroom has built in wardrobes and there are two shower rooms. All rooms face south with direct views onto the beautiful Portman Square gardens. Leasehold: 101 years

If you are looking to buy or sell and would like advice on the current market or a free market appraisal contact: Nicholas Jaffray 07515 777 634 Nicholas@Jaffray-Estates.co.uk www.Jaffray-Estates.co.uk

42 Upper Berkeley Street London W1H 5QL

Portman Square, Marylebone W1H

Guide Price: £2,595,000 Sole Agent

A bright and spacious apartment, on the 7th floor in this attractive portered block.

The property comprises a spacious reception/living space connected to a semi open plan style kitchen. There are two very good sized bedrooms, master with en suite shower plus a walk in wardrobe and a separate bathroom for bedroom two. There is a seperate utility room as well as further wardrobes plus the benefit of both a secure parking space and a storage locker. Leasehold: 101 years

Jaffray 07515 777 634

Nicholas@Jaffray-Estates.co.uk www.Jaffray-Estates.co.uk

Saddle Yard, Mayfair W1

£1,900pw/£8,233pcm

A refurbished duplex apartment in this private cobbled close. Reception, kitchen, 2 bedrooms, 2 bathrooms, garage parking, 24hr concierge, EPC - E, Council Tax (Westminster) - Band G, Security Deposit - £11,400

020 7486 6711

sales@mcglashans.co.uk / lettings@mcglashans.co.uk

Broadley Terrace, Lisson Grove NW1

£995pw/£4,312pcm

A newly neutrally decorated house in a gated development. Reception, kitchen, 3 bedrooms, 3 bathrooms, balcony, patio, gym, swimming pool, EPC – D, Council Tax – (Westminster) Band G, Security deposit - £5,970

Marylebone High Street, Marylebone W1 £845pw/£3,662pcm

A recently refurbished light 5th floor apartment. Living room, kitchen, dining hall, 2 bedrooms, bathroom, lift, daytime porter, EPC E, Council Tax (Westminster) Band - G, Security Deposit - £4,225

York Street, Marylebone W1

£850pw/£3,683 pcm

A beautiful apartment in a period house. Living room open plan to kitchen, 2 bedrooms, 2 bathrooms, private courtyard, EPC - C, Council Tax (Westminster) - Band F, Security Deposit - £4,250

Eaton Square, Belgravia SW1

£2,200pw/£9,533pcm

A stylishly refurbished maisonette. Living/dining room, kitchen, 2 bedrooms, 2 bathrooms, Juliet balcony, paved patio garden, 24hr porter, EPC - C, Council Tax (Westminster) – Band H , Security Deposit - £13,200

Enford Street, Marylebone W1

£2,750pw/£11,917pcm

A stylish 4 bedroom house. Double reception, 2nd reception, kitchen with dining area, 4 bedrooms, 3 bathrooms (1 en suite), patio garden, EPC - D, Council Tax (Westminster) - Band H, Security Deposit - £16,500

107 Crawford Street, London W1H 2JA www.mcglashans.co.uk

Jeremy James and Company

Jeremy James and Company

PORTLAND PLACE, MARYLEBONE, LONDON W1

A three bedroom apartment located on the third floor (with lift) of this refurbished period building moments from Regent’s Park.

This rarely available apartment is approximately 1,744 sq ft (162 sq m) and comprises of 3 bedrooms, one ensuite bathroom, cloakroom, reception room, kitchen and second bathroom. The apartment benefits from an abundance of light with views of Portland Place and private gardens at Regent’s Park. Resident parking permit available subject to usual consents.

The building is located on the east side of Portland Place close to the junction with Park Crescent. Marylebone High Street and Great Portland Street are within close proximity as well as the open spaces of Regent’s Park.

LEASEHOLD; £2,950,000

MARYLEBONE MEWS, MARYLEBONE VILLAGE, LONDON W1G

An extremely rare mews house on the market for the first time in over 20 years situated in one of the most desirable mews in Marylebone Village.

This three bedroom mews house is approximately 1,765 sq ft (164 sq m) and comprises of an entrance hall, reception room, three bedrooms, built in wardrobes, one ensuite bathroom, second bathroom, kitchen and vault area. The garage is available on a separate agreement, currently paying £5,300 per annum plus VAT.

Marylebone Mews is a quiet cul-de-sac located in the heart of the Marylebone Village which runs between Welbeck Street and Wimpole Street off New Cavendish Street, with Marylebone High Street within easy walking distance.

LEASEHOLD; £3,500,000

New Cavendish Street

London W1W

A beautiful, luxury apartment set within an exceptional 1890’s Victorian period building, comes with the highest quality of fixtures and fittings.

3 bedrooms • 3 bathrooms • Openplan kitchen / reception • Utility room • Second floor (with lift) • Porter

Guide price £4,000,000

Marylebone & Regent’s Park 020 7299 2447

david.ornsby@carterjonas.co.uk

Welbeck Street

London W1G

A fantastic apartment in excellent condition and situated in a recently refurbished building right in the heart of Marylebone Village.

First floor lateral apartment • Two double bedrooms • Two refurbished bathrooms • Large reception room • Modern kitchen • All wood floors • Lift

Guide price £2,400,000

Marylebone & Regent’s Park 020 7299 2447

david.ornsby@carterjonas.co.uk