The House of Soho

I have a phobia of wedding lists. They always seem very presumptuous. Friends ask for monstrous amounts of things that I’m sure they don’t really want. I look at their lists and my heart sinks. I know I should buy something, but what to choose from all the overpriced paraphernalia?

I wonder if the guests of Prince Harry and Meghan Markle felt the same way when their royal wedding invitations arrived. It had been announced that the pair didn’t want presents and instead, donations should be made to seven charities that reflected their ‘shared values’. But then came the news that their ‘private’ wedding list would be held with Soho House. Does a royal couple really need their friends and family to buy them stuff to set them on their way? And as for Soho House — really?

Soho House is an ‘exclusive members’ club’. Exclusive, that is, except for the fact there are now more Soho Houses in Britain than there are Butlins holiday camps. The club has an outpost in the Cotswolds called Soho Farmhouse, which offers a distinctly metropolitan vision of country life. There are charging stations for Tesla cars, no-swim zones and the grass is concreted over. Everything — bicycles, wellington boots, window panes — comes in 50 shades of teal.

The Soho House aesthetic has been the backdrop to Harry and Meghan’s story so far. Their first date was at a Soho House and Meghan’s three-day hen do was held at Soho Farmhouse. The global membership director Markus Anderson is a good pal of hers and is said to have introduced the couple at the Invictus Games.

Meghan was also a Soho House ‘brand ambassador’ so it’s unsurprising that she now wants to decorate her new home (or homes) to look like outposts of the club.