Why Didn't They Ask Jeeves?

The Lanesborough is home to a myriad of hedonistic delights, but the butler is the key to Zaneta Cheng uncovering the secrets of one of London’s great hotels

- Zaneta Cheng

THERE’S A MAN sitting on an ornate Regency-style chair outside one of the rooms near the main corridor on the second floor of The Lanesborough. The door behind him is slightly ajar and he has a rather dour expression – butter wouldn’t melt. Perhaps he’s there for an interview, I wonder. My first order of business when my own butler comes to enquire as to which tea and which newspaper I’d like to be woken up with at 6am the next morning, is to have a nosey into my enigmatic man. No wonder Agatha Christie had Miss Marple visit great houses all the time – turns out they really are the place for a good mystery.

My butler doesn’t know, but he does tell me that our floor houses The Lanesborough’s Royal Suite, which goes for a paltry rate of £26,000 a night. Because the suite is occupied during my stay, I can’t peek in for a look, and should I take any liberties through keyholes or what not someone will most likely do me in, but I learn that it comprises a total of seven rooms, with the main sky-blue living room covered in gold leaf and regularly booked out. There’s a dining room (seats 12) where the suite’s guests can gorge on breakfast, lunch, tea and dinner without ever leaving the rooms to mingle with the hoi polloi in the hotel’s celebrated Michelin star-decorated restaurant Céleste downstairs.