Hotfoots it to Mayfair - Mayfair Times

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EMBASSY LONDON
A month
in Mayfair
Fuller urges venues to club together
MARK FULLER, owner of club Embassy
London in Old Burlington Street, has set up
The Association of London Nightclubs to look
at the future of an industry he believes could
be dying and to shake off its negative image.
“We’ve created the image of this amazing
life – the Lamborghinis and the Rolls-Royces
turning up, short-skirted girls swanning in
and footballers drinking Cristal champagne,”
says Fuller.
“But the world has changed. The era of
the so-called celebrity on Big Brother or I’m a
Celebrity... Get Me Out Of Here! has gone.”
So far, the association has around 45
members including clubs such as Aura,
Movida, Jalouse, Vendome and Chinawhite.
“I think we’ve made history,” says Fuller,
“because the nightclub owners have never
got together before – we’ve always despised
each other. So the association has brought a
business community together and we can
now move forward.”
The association will work closely with the
police and council to help clamp down on
problems such as the use of fraudulent credit
cards, under-age drinking and violence.
“If the police believe the clubs are doing
Bond Street’s ahead
NEW BOND STREET is the most expensive retail
location in Europe, according to a report by
Cushman & Wakefield.
Shop rents saw a 19.4 per cent increase in the
last 12 months, rising to around £527 per sq ft per
annum – higher than those on Paris’s Avenue des
OZWALD BOATENG
closed London Fashion
Week with a show at the
Odeon in Leicester Square
featuring 100 male
models, including Sam
Branson (right). The Savile
Row tailor also debuted
part of his forthcoming
film “A Man’s Story”.
something wrong, they can come and talk to
us before they take action,” says Fuller. “The
bottom line is that if we don’t fix it, then
they’ve got every right to close a club down.”
Joseph Ryan, of Aura on St James’s
Street, agrees: “Any way that we can assist
the council and the police in making the
West End after dark a safer environment for
Londoners and indeed tourists can only be a
good thing. It’s great to dispel the
typecasting – [the idea] that everyone behind
nightclubs is a gangster.”
Fuller also questions the role of club
MARK FULLER
Champs-Élysées – with Zone A (the front area with
exposture to the street) rents reaching £925 per sq ft.
Cushman & Wakefield’s head of central London
retail, Peter Mace, said: “New Bond Street remains
one of the most sought-after locations in the world
for luxury brands.”
Demand from firms to secure premises is easily
outstripping supply, driving rents higher, he added.
promoters. “It’s got to the point where
London nightclubs are working on the most
ridiculous business model I’ve ever come
across in my life,” he says. “They pay people
to come in, they pay promoters to bring
people to come in for free – and then give
away free drinks, which is complete lunacy.
“Commercially, it’s crap, but it’s also
eroding what we are offering. You are
devaluing the feeling of the red rope – how
can you be exclusive when you let anybody
through the door?”
Fuller hopes the association will help to
bring the fun back into clubs and, in turn,
attract more people to return to London. “To
do that, he says, “we need to offer value for
money and give people a great night out.
A couple of clubs have started doing
entertainment now, and I applaud that,
because if you’re paying £20 to get in, at
least you’re getting something for it.”
Fuller says nightclubs are very much a
part of London life, but that every act of
violence in the capital has a negative effect
on business. “Every carjacking story and
every ram raid in Bond Street makes one
person less keen to come to London at
night,” he says.
“That’s why the clubs need to work
together. We are the only ones who can do it
because, as far as the government and
council are concerned, we’re a forgotten
industry. But we probably employ a good
100,000 people and the infrastructure that
relies on our income is even bigger – security
teams, the booze companies, the chefs, the
cab companies, the buses, the tubes.
“And we’re in competition with a lot of
cities – Miami, New York, Paris, Berlin – so
we have to get this right.”
PRINCE CHARLES opened the
grounds of his London home to
the public for a garden party to
promote sustainability.
Vivienne Westwood (pictured)
was one of the celebrity
speakers at the event, which
was held at Clarence House,
Lancaster House and
Marlborough House.
Fawn over Fornasetti
CULT DESIGN BRAND Fornasetti has launched a
concept store in Selfridges, presenting the largest
collection of Fornasetti products ever assembled in one
place in the UK.
Some of Fornasetti’s most recognised imagery
across dozens of product lines, from crockery and
ceramic plates to more substantial furniture pieces, will
be showcased in the Selfridges Wonder Room concept
space until October 15.
Fornasetti fans can also discover the brand’s first
fragrance – Fornasetti Profumi Per La Casa – and
Best of British
scented candles, produced exclusively for Selfridges. JERMYN STREET was last month turned
into an English garden party to celebrate
The Art of Being British, an event hosted
by The Crown Estate and Jermyn Street
Association.
The road was transformed into a traffic-
Brave outfit
PHOTO: LES BROWN
free zone for the day, while local retailers
and restaurants showcased their
specialties. The Ritz chef John Williams
MODEL AND ELECTRONIC VIOLINIST Linzi brands, including Matthew Williamson, Julien
demonstrated how to dress a salmon,
Stoppard wore this Jasper Conran creation [right] Macdonald and Vivienne Westwood, are giving
Dukes Bar mixed Martinis and Fortnum &
for the launch of Fashion For The Brave, a major their support to the event, which is in aid of three Mason had an al fresco tea party.
fashion event that takes place at The Dorchester main charities: Household Cavalry Operational
Musicians from the Royal Academy of
on October 26.
Casualties Fund, Help for Heroes and ABF The
Music performed popular British classics
More than 50 fashion designers and fashion Soldiers Charity.
and Morgan cars were out on display.
ON THE MORNING of the
ninth anniversary of the
terrorist attacks in New York
City, Pennsylvania and at the
Pentagon, US Ambassador
to the Court of St James’s
and Mrs Susman placed a
wreath at a memorial in
Grosvenor Square honouring
British victims.
Artists’ model
A GROUP OF 14 contemporary artworks
from the collection of model Jerry Hall is to
be offered for sale by Sotheby’s on October
15-16.
The highlight of the collection is Lucian
Freud’s 1997 oil on canvas Eight Months
Gone, which depicts the reclining Ms Hall
eight months’ pregnant with her fourth child
TATA NAKA opened a pop-up boutique
at 33 Bruton Place for Vogue’s Fashion’s
Night Out, with special guest DJs
Queens of Noize. Other highlights of the
evening, which saw stores across
Mayfair hold special events, included a
cocktail party at the Emporio Armani
store in New Bond Street, attended by
Giorgio Armani, Claudia Schiffer and
Gwyneth Paltrow.
Gabriel in 1997 [below]. Andy Warhol’s
acrylic and silk-screen ink on canvas Dollar
Sign is another star of the collection. The
work is signed and dedicated “To Jerry” on
the overlap.
The sales, which coincide with Frieze Art
Fair, are estimated to fetch more than £1.5
million.
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