Will Queen of Annabel’s take King of Club’s peace offering?
PRINCeSS Diana visited Annabel’s for the hen night of Sarah, Duchess of York, and Queen elizabeth paid a call for the 70th birthday of her friend, the Countess of Airlie, in 2003.
Yet there is one figure whose presence at the Mayfair private members’ club its owner, Richard Caring, is desperate to secure: Lady Annabel Goldsmith, after whom the celebrated venue was named.
I can disclose that Lady Annabel, the mother of government minister Lord (Zac) Goldsmith and film producer Jemima Khan, has been invited to the lavish party that ‘King of Clubs’ Caring is giving this Thursday to mark the 60th anniversary of the club in Berkeley Square.
Lady Annabel, who turns 89 this weekend, confirms that she has received an invitation but has not decided whether to attend.
‘It’s really sweet of them,’ she tells me. ‘The only thing about Annabel’s is that it is not really the basement that I remember.’
Billionaire Caring, who also owns fashionable London restaurants including Scott’s, The Ivy and J Sheekey, spent around £65 million in 2018 moving the club to a grade I- listed townhouse two doors down.
The widow of tycoon Sir James Goldsmith adds: ‘I have been asked to the party, but I do have one of the grandchildren’s birthdays on that day. I probably will go. I’ll have to see. I’ll be thinking of them.’
Caring’s invitation to Lady Annabel could be seen as an olive branch to her family that might end the feud that has simmered since her first husband, Mark Birley, sold the club and his other Mayfair nightspots to Caring, who turned 75 on Sunday, for a reported £100 million in 2007.
The sale devastated Mark’s son Robin, who had run Annabel’s until they fell out. Robin was prohibited from using his surname, Birley, for any other ventures.
In what has been dubbed in society circles ‘ the battle of Berkeley Square’, Robin went on to create the fashionable private members’ clubs 5 Hertford Street and Oswald’s, named after his grandfather, the society painter Sir Oswald Birley.
Lady Annabel is a regular visitor to his clubs, where members of the Royal Family often dine.
‘I love to go to my son Robin’s clubs,’ she tells me.
‘I go at least once or twice a week and have lunch or dinner with Robin.’