How the super rich stay pampered in the pandemic
Ringing a helpline to change the loo roll. Making a bed via Zoom. And forcing their chefs to lockdown with them... By the staff catering for their every whim
NO ONE knows the lifestyle impact of the pandemic on the wealthy in Britain better than Lucy Challenger. If you need someone to serve tea, polish the silver, press table linens and drive you to Harrods, Lucy’s company
Polo & Tweed, a recruitment agency for the ultra wealthy, can help.
It has more than 15,000 nannies, chauffeurs, housekeepers and butlers on its books, all of whom are trained in the many kinds of jobs required by the s uper- r i ch. But when Covid- 19 happened, Lucy’s phone began to ring with very unusual requests.
‘One lady in Chelsea couldn’t change her loo roll,’ she says. ‘To be fair, she did have quite a complex one, not just a slide-off-and-on one.’
‘How do you wash wool?’ was another question. ‘Can you put different colours in together?’ Another lady didn’t know where the vacuum cleaner was kept, so she ordered a new one from Amazon.
When the country went into lockdown in March, Government guidelines stated only key workers could go into work. That did not include home help — until the rules were relaxed in May.
The rich were suddenly being faced
with the task of doing their own cleaning.
Lucy is sympathetic. ‘If you are dealing with a house that has more than 40 bedrooms, for example, or looking after luxury linens, silks and cashmeres, these are specialist skills and, unless you’ve been shown how to do it, you may not know what to do,’ she says. ‘It was new territory for everyone.’
for example, marble should be wiped with a damp cloth, not scrubbed with a scourer, which is what one of Lucy’s clients used to remove the hair dye she’d dropped in her luxury bathroom .‘ The photos we saw. Yeah, I felt very bad for her.’
Much of Polo & Tweed’s work now happens on screens, with Zoom calls and an‘ online learning platform’, which takes clients through basics such as how to make a bed and open a these wine bottle.
are families who are never normally in one place for long, Lucy explains. If they don’t like winter, they fly towards summer. When they tire of the city, they go the country, and vice-versa. They have no idea about what’s in their multi-million-pound kitchen. And suddenly they’re having to hunt for the frying pan.
‘even basics such as the dishwasher and washing machines, it’s not often the owners would know how to use them,’ says Claire reddington, 47, a house manager, ‘And it’s all so techie now. It’s not just turn the dial and put it on at 30c. They literally had no idea.’
Thankfully, says Lucy, Lockdown 2.0 has been different to the first in that domestic staff have been allowed to go to work. However, this does not mean routines for the rich have gone back to what they were before. Covid has gone right to the heart of the homes of the ultra-wealthy, too, changing their entire lifestyles.
first, the emphasis is now on livein staff, to protect the family, says Lucy. It’s a social order that’s being revived in the time of Covid, a throwback to the world of downton Abbey when staff were always expected to live in.
The Queen is said to have wanted staff to stay locked in the Sandringham bubble for four weeks over Christmas, away from their families and loved ones.
‘normally you have a bit of a divide between families and staff, but we’ve had reports of staff being invited to join the families for dinner, or to sit down and have a drink with family. It’s become almost like a world war situation — we’re in this together!’ says Lucy.
except, this is not the case for staff being asked to do twice as much work. ‘Before the pandemic, when bags of shopping arrived, the housekeeper would just unload everything. now hours are being spent with anti-bacterial sprays, “anti-baccing” everything, outside, before it even gets into the house.
‘A lot of families also did big clearouts during the first lockdown,’ she continues. ‘Whereas staff would do deep cleaning every couple of months, suddenly it was the whole house. everything was taken out, all the cupboards were emptied. Big skips were being called to empty all these storage areas.’
With the new emphasis on multitasking, nannies who cook, and housekeepers who are trained beauticians are at a premium. ‘They do hair, make-up, waxing, everything, like a glam squad!’ says Lucy. ‘ You’re not allowed to have a personal stylist going into your home, but if that person is already working for your family, you are literally sitting pretty for all your Zoom meetings,’ she says.
erren nathaniel Gem, 31, has paid the price for being a live-out chef. Before the pandemic, he worked regularly for two families, preparing ‘ big shebangs’ of up to 70 people. His specialism: Italian and Japanese. But as big parties are on hold and housekeepers are filling in as chefs, work has been scarce. His last job was three months ago. ‘I had to have a Covid test, wear a mask and keep everything a lot cleaner than usual,’ he says.
Some chefs even have to wear full
One lady didn’t know where the vacuum cleaner was kept, so she ordered a new one
PPE — masks and visors — in communal areas; disposable gloves as well. They are required to change their clothes as soon as they step into the family home in order not to bring in any pathogens.
Christmas is always a busy time for any private chef, but the regulations have made large parties a thing of the past. ‘People are going for more extravagance, but in a smaller fashion,’ says Lucy.
erren is booked for an event on december 13. ‘The family have houses in London and the countryside as well. So I will go with them to their farm, shoot some birds — pheasants, quails — then cook them. It’s from farm to table.’
Hebe Silva, 50, is happy to live in, but even t he r i ch are now constrained by a lack of space. As a full-time maternity nurse, her job consists entirely of looking after newborns: changing nappies; burping; bathing; waking the baby for a feed every two-and-a-half hours (around half of mothers breast feed) and laundry.
She offered to work full-time for one f amily. But Covid meant ‘daddy’ had to work at home and wanted the spare room as his office. ‘Grandmother was in the nursery because she couldn’t go back to her country. They didn’t have space for me to live in.
‘It was very unusual because most of the clients I work for have huge