MODERN LIFE

AStatus symbols All of the new ways to get in with the in‑crowd

It’s not just the superclever stuff that gives you status points these days. It’s the cocktail of high and low

ccording to Tatler, it’s a pizza oven in your garden and a wine cellar. It’s whippets. Or it’s dinner parties at which you serve Ottolenghi dishes. It could be reusable cloth nappies in limited edition prints (now going for as much a £160 a pair). If you’re Nigerian, it’s having pizzas flown 4,000 miles – on a British Airways flight – from London, according to comments from the country’s agriculture minister.

These are just a random selection of this year’s status symbols, apparently, and proof that it’s not easy to keep up with what’s on the list. It’s just a bit of fun, although fairly accurate. Obviously.

Being “well-watched” as opposed to well-read. We’ve said this before – loads – but now we’re at a point where TV trumps everything including your tickets to Hamilton and

Betrayal. Status-watching covers the spectrum from

Line of Duty to Fleabag but the point is you really have to know your status watches from your so whats. Masterchef, yes. Bake Off, not any more.

Antiques Roadshow, yes, Call the Midwife, no, and so on. It’s not just the superclever stuff that gives you status points these days. It’s the cocktail of high and low and in the know and one season ahead.

A smart book club. As in a book club attended by people you think are smart, where you read the literary equivalent of TV Gold.

A woke husband. You know, the sort who is basically better at child care than his wife and knows more about the menopause. We’re trying to think of an excellent example of woke married manliness, but we may have to settle for Tom Hiddleston.

Fresh flower deliveries. It was an organic vegetable box, now it’s seasonal flowers, locally sourced by an enterprising young man with a nose piercing.

Large romantic gardens in the city, eg nothing paved over and maybe a home-made swing.

Commissioned portraits, or even better, sculpture.

Vegan paint. As preferred by Meghan Markle for the nursery at Frogmore Cottage.

Having more than two spare rooms (see Frogmore Cottage).

Knowing power players. This one represents quite a big shift: the ultimate status activity used to be rubbing shoulders with royalty and aristos, actors and It girls – gosh, what you wouldn’t do to be in a room with Hugh Grant and Mick Jagger. Now it’s being at the table with the people shaping history, be that politicians, philanthropists or Emily Maitlis. If you’re a celebrity, like George Clooney, all you really want is to be part of the political conversation (though you also quite like being in the Sussexes’ Circle of Trust).

Six hundred thread count sheets or, if you’re really going for it, linen.

A firepit.

First night tickets. Vintage Ossie Clark dresses.

Really old dogs of the normal breed variety (eg, non-cute) indicating you were ahead of the fairy-cake-isation of dogs.

Having fruit cages or a grass tennis court.

A connected godparent (see Cara Delevingne and Dame Joan Collins, Damian Hurley and Sir Elton John).

A real fire, burning real branches and logs, not cylindrical stacking logs.

A daughter who is excelling at football and a son who is going to be the next Sergei Polunin.

Society grey hair (long and shiny and glamorous).

Being recognised by the staff in a King and Corbin restaurant.

Gucci trainers, still. Gucci shoes, full stop.

Having a dermatologist (this may or may not be a euphemism for someone who nips and tucks and fills but, either way. A genuine skin polisher is a status symbol, too).

Children under 12 who can ski like demons.

Very well-preserved feet and hands.

Ballet classes (for adults). That’ll do for a bit.