The Roster · Knightsbridge · SW1X
Bianka, and the risotto she would have stirred longer
Hazel eyes, a coat from another decade and very firm views on stock.
Available todayDinner dates, best with a few hours' notice
- Age
- 23
- Height
- 165 cm · 5 ft 5 in
- Hair
- long, light brown with sun-kissed ends
- Eyes
- hazel
- Figure
- curvy
- Languages
- English
- Home district
- Knightsbridge · SW1X, SW7
Bianka, in brief
Bianka reads a menu the way a tailor reads a pattern, for what has been left out. She is 165 cm with a soft, curvy figure, and her light brown hair falls long, paler at the ends where the summer lifted it. Hazel eyes, greener under lamplight. Much of her wardrobe comes from the archive rails of dealers she has trusted for years: a structured coat cut decades ago, a silk square knotted at the wrist, shoes chosen for a long evening rather than a photograph.
Attentive was the word Cressida wrote after their first coffee, and it has held. Bianka notices a low glass before the waiter does and remembers the colleague you named once, an hour earlier. She is warm in an unhurried way, with a low voice that seldom needs raising, and she is in her early twenties. English is her language. Italian cooking is her devotion, learned slowly and mostly by error; wine tastings come next, pencil in hand, and vintage clothes after that, where she needs no notes at all.
Her W1 evening likes to begin at Cecconi's on Burlington Gardens, on a corner stool at the bar, with small Venetian plates to share and a question for the barman about which bottle he would open for himself. She treats the menu as a conversation rather than a list. Dinner may stay put or drift somewhere quieter near the square. Either way she keeps the pace gentle, and the evening never feels steered, although it is, very kindly.
Knightsbridge is home, about twelve minutes by cab from most Mayfair addresses. The hour begins at £600, and the booking page sets out how Cressida arranges a first evening.
The hours, priced
The Society's figures apply to Bianka as to everyone on the roster: stated in pounds, given to her yourself at the door, and with her journey inside Zones 1 and 2 already folded in.
| Hour | Length | Fee | Suits | Enquire |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 19:00 | One hourThe introduction | £600 | Long enough for a glass at the bar and a proper conversation, and a gentle way to begin. | Enquire |
| 23:00 | Ninety minutesThe nightcap | £900 | The hour with room left over for a second glass and an unhurried goodbye. | Enquire |
| 21:00 | Two hoursThe long drink | £1,100 | An evening in, or an opening two streets away, without anyone glancing at a watch. | Enquire |
| 22:00 | Three hoursThe second act | £1,500 | Supper somewhere small, then the remainder of the evening at a pace you set together. | Enquire |
| 20:00 | Four hoursThe table for two | £1,800 | Shaped around a single good table, from the first course to the last car home. | Enquire |
| 00:00 | Ten hoursUntil morning | £3,000 | From the first glass of the evening to breakfast in the suite. Ask a day ahead where you can. | Enquire |
| Fri | Two nights or moreThe weekend away | from £6,000 | In London or further afield, with one figure for the whole stay once the dates are fixed. | Enquire |
Past Zone 2, airports and changes of plan: Rates
Bianka, after dark
Bianka would rather dine late than dine fast. She suggests eight o'clock in the bar of your hotel, looks at what you are drinking and orders something that flatters it. By nine you are at a table she chose because the kitchen still rolls its pasta by hand, and she is explaining, with genuine feeling, why cheese has no business near the seafood. There is no lecture in it; she is delighted by good food and assumes you will be too. Afterwards comes a slow walk past the lit windows of Bond Street, where she points out a 1968 coat she has visited three times and still cannot justify. Then one last glass somewhere hushed, and the sort of conversation that turns a Tuesday into a small holiday.
Bianka answers
Walk away from it. Twenty minutes, one wooden spoon, the stock kept hot beside the pan. People think the secret is butter. The secret is standing there.
The sixties for the cut and the seventies for the colour. I wear one and borrow shamelessly from the other.
As though we had never met. Favourites deserve a second look, the way old friends do, and they sometimes surprise you.
Remarks in the book
The page is still blankNo remarks have been entered for Bianka yet. When a guest writes something worth keeping, and she agrees, it appears here beneath the guest's first name, with the month set beside it. Nothing on this page is ever composed by the Society.
Entered only after Cressida has read them · signed with a first name and the month only · withdrawn whenever Bianka asks
A line for Bianka
Bianka is already named. Fill in the brackets, send it, and Cressida answers every line in a single reply.
Good evening Cressida. May I book Bianka for [length] on [date], from [time]? I shall be at [hotel name], and will pass on the room number once you confirm.
Also based in Knightsbridge
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Danielle
From After Dark Notes
- 5 min readGame at the grand tables: the British calendar from the Twelfth to winter venisonGrouse on the Twelfth, partridge in September, pheasant and woodcock by October, venison as the nights draw in. How to dine the British game calendar in W1, and with whom.
- 5 min readSix at midnight: the suite as an after-dinner salon, with a guest who hosts beside youWhen the restaurant stacks its chairs and nobody wants the night to end, the suite becomes the salon. Warning the hotel, ordering ahead, glassware, music and a companion who co-hosts.
Send word about Bianka
Mention Bianka by name and the evening you have in mind. If she is spoken for, Cressida will say so plainly and suggest someone close in spirit.