Savile Row soirée

It's party season, of course, and I thought I'd share these pics (my social life very seldom being quite this high-end) of an unusual and fabulous venue for a Christmas drinks party last weekend ... in Savile Row, London's home for bespoke men's tailoring. 

I forget which store this was, above, but I loved the stylish window decoration

We were headed for Hardy Amies (below), which was far too discreet to have any window displays, but where a welcoming fire awaited in the entrance and champagne was on ice in an elegant room upstairs with a view to the street through huge sash windows ...

The house, 14 Savile Row, has a colourful history: the poet/playwright Sheridan lived here before his death in 1816, and supposedly hid from his creditors, as they ascended the staircase below, in a hollow bench just below this window ... 

Hardy Amies moved in here in 1945, and the room below has every copy of Vogue from that year up to the present in bound volumes. Do watch this totally charming short clip here summing up in pictures Hardy's transformation of the house and his heydays in it.

I loved the sparse, clean interiors of the shop itself downstairs ...

Amies was most famously designer of the queen's dresses, from her coronation onwards, and in the 50s and 60s was perhaps Britain's most famous couturier. More recently and since his death, his has become exclusively a men's fashion line. 

Some of Amies' best known creations from past decades are displayed in the store, from tweed and worsted skirt suits accessorised with fox fur to this silk gown made for the Duchess of Kent ...

And what was today's London woman wearing to the party? Dresses were short, the ground-rule was black with splashes of silver or colour, the fun was in the accessories ...

All photos taken with my iPhone camera, useful for discreet snapping, not so hot on quality :)