Let’s get one thing straight: I’m not usually in the business of tutting at shoes. I’m not the keeper of the brogue, nor the patron saint of patent leather.
But when a man hosts a dinner at his own three-Michelin-starred restaurant to celebrate the newly knighted Sir David Beckham, and turns up in a tuxedo paired with gleaming white trainers — well, I start to wonder if the world hasn’t finally gone mad.
Now, of course, Gordon Ramsay owns the place. If anyone can decide the dress code at a table of his own, it’s the chef-proprietor himself. He can serve pigeon in a paddling pool and wear pyjamas if he likes. But ownership doesn’t equal immunity from taste. There’s a line between “relaxed contemporary cool” and “I’ve given up”. And I’m afraid, Gordon, that night you were teetering perilously close to the latter — in trainers, no less.
What made the spectacle even starker was the company. This wasn’t a boozy mates-only dinner down the King’s Road. It was a black-tie celebration for Beckham’s knighthood — the culmination of a decades-long campaign of service, brand management and quiet self-reinvention. And Sir David, to his eternal credit, turned up looking like a walking Bond franchise: the tux razor-sharp, the shoes mirror-bright, posture immaculate. Even, the now Lady Victoria, never knowingly underdressed, embodied old-school grace. Around the table, guests glimmered in black and silk, the dining room itself a temple of fine formality. Then there was Gordon, beaming proudly, I’m sure for pone of his closest friends, but looking as if he’d dashed straight from the pass to the party without time to lace up.
Support authors and subscribe to content
This is premium stuff. Subscribe to read the entire article.
