How to be a good host
When I was young, I thought the worst thing you could do, as a host, was to run out of booze. Then, when I was less young, I thought it was to not have enough food, and now I am perfectly wise, I know that those things don’t matter at all, because you can always go to the shop. The important thing is not to look harried, and to not look that way, you need to not be that way.
It’s a psychodynamically interesting thing, to invite people into your home: intimate and familial; generous – your friends will want to repay that by making you happy, and if you’re stressed instead, they’ll leave with an inchoate sense of guilt and discomfort. Every catering decision, guest list and to-do list should be made with this at the front of your mind: am I the kind of person who can put the finishing touches on a croquembouche and chat about Dolly Parton at the same time? Am I going to spend the whole night man-marking that friend who goes back a long way but now has some dicey views about 5G and Albanians? Do I absolutely need to clean the skirting boards?
How to be a good guest
Some absolute basics: you can be a bad guest even if you don’t go, by texting 20 minutes ahead and saying you can’t make it. Never do this. Cancel a week ahead, or apologise the next day. I read once that you should never arrive with flowers; send them earlier in the day. That sounds like the kind of thing posh people do, but it’s good not to arrive with something that immediately creates a task. Only bring flowers to someone you know well enough that you can find a vase and sort it yourself. I have a friend who arrives everywhere with a big bag of ice, which is weirdly useful and also, an icebreaker. You just go, “Look, ice!”
I have another friend who arrives everywhere with a gigantic watermelon, and it’s hard to say how useful that is, but it’s also an ice-breaker. Don’t stick rigidly to other guests you know best – it creates cliques. Incorporate anyone standing alone, or if that’s you, gatecrash a clique. I have no prescription about what mood you should be in or what topics you should introduce. The chemical reaction between authentic selves is what the whole thing is supposed to be all about.
How to draw up a guest list
There’s a lot of subjectivity here: I have a friend who curates her guest lists incredibly carefully, pictures the room in her head like an Elizabethan masque, mentally pairing off friends who share a love of the Fall or whose mothers were both impossible in the same way. I also have friends who have a list of anchor guests, people without whom the party cannot occur, and all other invites will revolve around whether they are liked or disliked by the anchors, and all of that works – you can definitely engineer some fast friendships. I, by contrast, invite everyone in my phone, which throws up some surprises, like the vet. I had a party for the general election and invited the Ocado delivery guy (he came; he was fun).
How to dress
For the general party, there is no rule, except – again – consistency. If you’re the kind of person (my brother) who would go to Buckingham Palace bare-chested in dungarees, then you’ll be comfortable whatever you’re wearing. But if you’re someone who feels nicety quite keenly, you should take multiple soundings ahead from everyone else you know who’s going – otherwise you’ll be embarrassed, and you won’t take a good time with you. If there’s any kind of theme, take it seriously: it’s your signal that you’re happy to be there, and grateful for the invitation. Unless everyone knows you’re a curmudgeon and they like you anyway, in which case, the dungarees are still fine.
How to handle different dietary preferences and cultures
I’m ashamed to say this, but it never naturally occurred to me – I had to be told multiple times – that people with allergies, intolerances, preferences and cultural requirements around food need to be accommodated more thoughtfully than just putting something out for them that they’re not allergic to. I’ve served bone marrow with a vegan at the table; I’ve handed a vegetarian a beer when I’ve just put out smoked salmon and not washed my hands; I’ve had a Christmas party that was maybe 70:30 godless: Muslim, and everything on the buffet that was not made of pork sat directly next to something that was. Create separate areas if it’s a stand-up party; consider, if you have a lot of vegetarians, leaving meat out altogether. Whether it’s a preference or a blue-lights EpiPen emergency, people shouldn’t have to confront a thing they don’t like everywhere they look. These days I keep the voice of my vegan friend in my head: her mum used to try to serve her pasta and meatballs, with the meat just fished out, and she said, “If I cooked a stew of human fingers, and just removed the fingers, would you find that distasteful?”
What’s in your brain larder?
Nigella Lawson’s golden rule (one of about a million, all of them gold), was not to try out something new for the first time when you have a bunch of people round (see first principles: don’t get stressed). This will inevitably mean that there will be things you’ve made a hundred times, and you’ve done that because they’re easy and showstopping and delicious (I’ve been making a slow-roast lamb with feta, peppers and dill from Sainsbury’s magazine for 20 years now) but also, that you’re a bit bored by them. I have two friends who cater each other’s parties, a dazzling fix.
How to do placement
Boy/girl/boy/girl is the kind of thing gen Z laughs at us for, because it’s so 1950s. But if you don’t stick to it, it’s amazing how easily you can end up totally gender segregated, which makes for a weird table, asymmetrical levels of laughter, and everyone getting fomo. Always separate couples. Martha Stewart arranged a table to a pattern of threes – neutral, interesting, boring – because two boring people next to each other will create a cold zone that can spread, and two interesting people next to each other is a waste.
How to drink
This depends how old you are. In teenagehood, the foothills of binge drinking, getting drunk and incapable is mortifying, because it makes you look immature. By your 20s and 30s, it’s the handful of people who were lit up like a Christmas tree that made the evening memorable, and it’s fine if tonight that’s going to be you. By your 40s and 50s, realistically, being drunk isn’t going to make you do an interesting thing, like get off with your childhood sweetheart or set fire to a gazebo. It’s just going to make you tired and slow-witted, irascible and insensitive or repetitive and obsessional. So, however many drinks you have to stick to to avoid being any of those things, that’s how you should drink.
How to introduce people if you can’t remember their names
Ugh, you know, an etiquette expert will say, “Just be frank, and say, ‘I’m so sorry, I’ve lost your name,’” but they don’t understand how mortifying it is when you’ve known someone 20 years and your brain has somehow voided this only bit of information about them that matters. I used to turn to the person I was introducing the forgetee to, and say, “I’m so sorry, I’ve forgotten your name,” hoping that would trigger a cacophony where everyone just said their own name at once. Then I got caught out horribly by someone saying, “How can you have forgotten Tim’s name? You’ve been best friends since 1996.” Now I just create diversions: “Didn’t you two meet that time we went to [insert weird activity, such as mudlarking or fireworks] in [insert a season or an area, not a year, which is too specific].” There will be a moment of confusion, and then they will say, “No, I wasn’t there. Hi, I’m Ben.”
How to deal with tricky people
It really depends on what kind of tricky; if they’re boring, you, as the host, have to rescue anyone they’ve cornered, and this is a whole-evening task, so you either have to put not-boring people on a rota for it or not invite them. Same if they’re a boor. A lot of people have a thing they do when they’re drunk – take their clothes off, start an argument, start crying, or break things – and you are absolutely fine to say, “You’re doing that thing you do when you’re drunk.” Even the most bellicose pisshead will take this rebuke in the spirit of fond acceptance.
How to leave
It actually doesn’t matter, so long as you’re consistent. I have a friend who always does a French exit (slip off quietly before anyone’s noticed – also known, incomprehensibly, as the Irish goodbye) and nobody ever says, “Was Charlotte in a bad mood?” – whereas if I did that, people would think I’d been kidnapped. If you’re leaving first, don’t say, “Does anyone want to share an Uber?”, because you’ll clear the table; but if you’re leaving penultimately, definitely do say that, because there’s a good chance you should already have left. Don’t cue up for ages that you can’t stay long because of the babysitter or tomorrow’s early start or whatever – it casts a pall unnecessarily. Most important: once you’ve decided to leave, actually leave; don’t stand for ages in your coat, having one last conversation.