LUXURY IS a much overused word. Often it turns out to be just code for expensive — and we’ve all learnt the hard way that the two things are not necessarily, nor even very often, connected. Real luxury does — sob, sob— usually turn out to be expensive but a lot of things with hi-de-hi price tags are nothing more than tasteless tat (a game I sometimes play when I’m in a swanky store is ticking off all the stratospherically priced stuff I wouldn’t give room to — it’s even more fun than buying).
If, however, you’re at all interested in what I call real, serious, deeply desirable luxury, then it has to be the small, carefully edited collection of clothing and home wares that Lady Bamford (of JCB and Daylesford Organic Farm fame) has slowly put together over the past few years.
You’re not going to find these on every high street. In fact, you’re going to have to phone to make an appointment to see the set in London or trek out to Daylesford in Gloucestershire. But believe me, if you share my notion of luxury, it’ll be worth it.
The abiding quality of the Mossop Street showroom — a light-filled all-white modernist space — is a sense of calm and tranquillity, and somehow this seems to have been transmitted to the wares, which are mostly white or cream and which exude nothing so much as what Lady Bamford calls “invisible luxury”. Nothing shouts. There are no spangles (actually, come to that, there are just a few, on one of the kaftans), no loud colours, no look-at-me concoctions — all is calm, beautiful and quietly sophisticated. These things seem to be an extension of Lady Bamford’s own world, reflecting her preference for the understated but beautiful, for the comfortable and easy, for things that are informal rather than formal and for things that embrace what she calls “mind, body and spirit”.
What Lady Bamford has done is very sensibly to recruit some people with amazing taste and lots of knowhow who share her own approach to what might be called (her own phrase) “invisible” luxury and then to embark on a careful search to unearth or produce only things that meet all their exacting standards. Much of it has a handmade or artisanal base. To be more specific: there is, for instance, some very fine but very plain linen — large, simple napkins, handstitched sheets and pillow cases (which can be monogrammed), all made by two women working away by hand in a church in Montecatini, Italy, whom Lady Bamford first came across when she went there on holiday. At first sight it might look little different from other linen, but look more closely, feel it and you can see why she went to such trouble to source it. On top of the linen you might put one of the quilts — all in white, again it seems effortlessly simple, but if you look closely you’ll see it ‘s made of patches of the most intricate stitching. Anybody who wants different sizes or shapes or wants something more intricate can order it to measure. Because Lady Bamford is, as I’ve already pointed out, rather keen on a holistic approach to life, there is a collection of clothing for the yoga-committed. All in either white or black organic cotton and it comes with its own suede yoga bag (£230 in a mink shade or black). The clothing consists of a range of vests and T-shirts (from £95) and yoga pants (£130).
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For hot days and holidays there is some fantastically chic but dead-plain white linen clothing — trousers, skirts, jackets, shirts. Some desirable kaftans, exquisitely made of silk chiffon with very fine beading providing some low-key but glamorous decoration, or of cotton (£520 in cotton, but if that seems expensive look at the beading — it is quite beautiful).
There are some exquisite kaftans — in silk chiffon, lined, edged with very fine beading in white, cream or palest, palest grey. They also come, like the one in our picture, in cotton (£520).
For now — and any winter to come — there is a simply cut, easy, unlined coat in double-faced cashmere, the sort of thing you shrug on like a cardigan and then feel a million dollars. It is £795 which, for cashmere of this quality, is not expensive. The cream sheepskin cape featured here (£1,655, very Audrey Hepburn circa 1950s), is buttersoft to to the touch.
Lady Bamford knows a thing or three about travel so she knows what’s needed when you’re flying long-haul.
There’s a canvas travel bag (£170) into which can be put a range of whatever takes the fancy, but in winter it might include, say, some fine cashmere socks (£28 in that mink colour), a cashmere travel wrap (£350), a linen-covered neck pillow (£90), a small washbag (£45) and a minuscule hot-water bottle (covered in linen, £40).
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The homeware collection is small and evolving slowly. Take the tea-strainer — Lady Bamford came upon a beautiful variation on this standard domestic object at a Goldsmith’s Hall exhibition in the City and promptly ordered eight for the shop. There’s also a beautiful silver jug, slightly asymmetrical but otherwise exquisitely simple. There are some beautiful ceramics from Japan and in particular there are some ethereally beautiful ceramic plates with just a very slight variation in the edges which stop them from looking like something from an industrial production line. They come in different sizes and shapes and in white, stone and eau-de-nil — mix them up as you will.
Then there is the jewellery collection, which consists of lots of tiny little crosses that are often sewn into some of the clothing but can also be bought separately. The jewellery also provides one of the rare touches of colour in the shop because there are some pieces in turquoise chrysoprase — a ring for £75, a wonderfully chunky cuff for £500 and a jade- chrysoprase cross necklace, which is £150. The green necklace shown here is made from fluorite and costs £300.
Gradually, new items will be introduced, when the team comes across things that meet all the exacting criteria. It is still what Lady Bamford calls a “work in progress”. As I write, she’s in India, tracking down jewellers and embroiderers — she thinks that perhaps she should introduce just a little colour, to relieve the almost monastic purity of the collection. Whatever it is that she comes back with, one thing is for sure, there’s not going to be a lot of it, it will be the finest of its kind and I’d be enormously surprised if you didn’t love it for ever.
Bamford, 19 Mossop Street, London SW3 (appointment only: 020-7581 4242 ) and the Bamford Barn, Daylesford, Gloucestershire (01608-731 700)