Nicky Haslam

How will Carrie cope with the hideousness of Chequers?

1 May 2021 9:00 am

Zut alors! The court of King Boris gets more like Versailles each day. With some talcum powder on that ramshackle…

Nicky Haslam: How will Boris decorate No. 10?

10 August 2019 9:00 am

‘Volcanic temper… suspicious of everyone… irritability, mood swings… terror stalking the shadows… devastating collapse of Europe’s economy… rampant insecurity, unbridled…

All smiles: the Duke and Duchess of Windsor in early days

The Wallis Simpson I knew – by Nicky Haslam

12 May 2018 9:00 am

One would have thought this particular can of worms might, after nearly 80 years, be well past its sell-by date.…

William Cavendish, 1st Duke of Newcastle, performing volte, with Bolsover Castle in the background. (Painting after Abraham Jansz. van Diepenbeeck). Bryant is particularly severe on the subject of racing and horse breeding

Bryant’s tyrants: Chris Bryant bashes the British aristocracy

16 December 2017 9:00 am

I rashly discarded this book’s dustjacket when I received it, and thus saw only the unlettered cover, a faded photograph…

Her story bubbles with the funny and the famous: Lyndall Hobbs with Al Pacino in 1990

Nicky Haslam: my two absolutely fabulous girlfriends

4 June 2016 9:00 am

Many years ago, working on a project in Tel Aviv, I had a meeting-free weekend. I know, I thought, I’ll…

Clothes to die for

12 December 2015 9:00 am

People tend to use the term ‘fashion victim’ somewhat damningly — and maybe jealously — to describe someone obsessed by…

Mary Portas: anything but ordinary

Madly Modern Mary overcomes childhood hardships to become the Queen of Shops

14 March 2015 9:00 am

In this autobiography, Mary Portas doesn’t dip into the fabled store of her talents by giving an account of her…

Nicky Haslam’s diary: Marie-Anna Berta Felicie Johanna Ghislaine Theodora Huberta Georgina Helene Genoveva and other big names

10 January 2015 9:00 am

I was once bundled into a police car in Palm Springs to explain why I didn’t have snow-tyres on my…

Elsa Schiaparelli in an apartment in the Place Vendôme, in the shadow of Napoleon

Nicky Haslam on sharing a lover with Elsa Schiaparelli and the endearing punk of Vivienne Westwood

15 November 2014 9:00 am

A comet streaked into France in the 1930s, its fallout sending the staid echelons of haute couture into a tailspin.…

Cecil Beaton with Mickey the cat, Reddish house (self-portrait)

The genius of Cecil Beaton’s interiors

15 November 2014 9:00 am

The odds were a hundred to one against him. Brought up in bourgeois Bayswater by genteel parents, Cecil Beaton was…

Cecil Beaton, self-portrait, 1936

Cecil Beaton, the bitch

20 September 2014 9:00 am

Beaton was the great inventor. Apart from inventing not only himself but his look, his voice, his persona and a…

A summer's social whirl, from Bette Midler to Satan

13 September 2014 9:00 am

This summer brought highs and lows, sadness and laughter, some irritating, some exhilarating. I was fortunate to be uplifted by…

Joan Fontaine at home

Tea with Greta Garbo's decorator

19 April 2014 9:00 am

Many people write, or at least used to write, fan letters to their film favourites. Usually all they received in…