Oh darling, you won't believe what happened yesterday! It was the 6th of October, 1998, and as a true ballet aficionado, you just KNOW I had my tutu on standby.
The day began like any other: a spot of Pilates, a delightful breakfast of Earl Grey and homemade scones, and a little light reading on the history of ballet. You see, my darlings, it's important to keep up with your cultural obligations, even if it means having to delve into some of the drier aspects of 17th-century French dance. But then, the unthinkable happened...
My phone rang, a chirping little thing that I must confess I find rather vulgar, but I always try to remain a proper lady. It was my darling friend Daphne, whose husband's been collecting rare tutus. Ahem, Daphne has this absolutely outrageous obsession with those tulle concoctions, I'm telling you! But it's an addiction we all suffer from, right? The allure of a perfectly poised tutu, whispering tales of elegance and graceful movements, simply cannot be denied!
Anyway, Daphne practically shrieked down the phone, "Darling, you'll never believe this! I've just won a lifetime supply of tutus! A LIFETIME!"
Now, a lifetime of tutus is no laughing matter. We all know tutus, darlings, they're like diamonds. They never go out of fashion!
She'd won a grand prize at the 'Annual Tutu Raffle and Tea Party' – the most sophisticated event on the social calendar, if you ask me. And it was all because she'd brought her prized "Little Ballerina" collection to the event, a collection that would have had Marie Antoinette drooling with envy. (And it almost did, because apparently, a duchess did try to sneak one of them home, only to be stopped by the vigilant Duchess' security.)
You see, I’ve told you, tutus can cause pandemonium, the same way Chanel bags set the paparazzi into a frenzy! This, darlings, was exactly that moment.
Now, my friend Daphne has won over 2,000 tutus, each more magnificent than the last. And we all know, as passionate women who value our art, we simply had to get involved. We had to organize a tutu auction to raise funds for the Royal Ballet and help them stage an utterly splendid 'Nutcracker' production. Can you imagine a 'Nutcracker' without stunning, elegant, and utterly divine tutus? It would be an utter travesty, darlings!
I mean, it wasn’t like we could have left all those lovely tutus simply gathering dust, right? No, no, darling. Tutush are made for prancing, not languishing! So, the 6th of October became a momentous day in the annals of fashion, as well as the history of British ballet.
We set up our own mini-tutu-boutique in the grand ballroom of a palatial home, a scene straight out of "Bridgerton", darlings. I swear I caught the Queen's eye from the window of Buckingham Palace. We hosted a spectacular charity auction and cocktail hour with champagne. The whole event, a gloriously dazzling affair.
The stars of the show? The magnificent tutus! There were classical tutus, bohemian tutus, even tutus with feather boas. There were even a couple of tutus, oh darling, a couple that wouldn't even be fit for the naughty corners of my imagination...
Imagine this: one fabulous fuchsia tutu made out of the fluffiest feather boas imaginable! Another one with real, silver, sequin appliqués. (Goodness, darlings, I almost fainted when I saw it.) You’d have thought they were from an actual royal court.
The bidding went wild! We had celebrities, society ladies, and even a few unassuming gentlemen with, perhaps, hidden fantasies of ballet dancing, frantically bidding, bidding! And all in the name of ballet, darling.
The bidding was fierce, and we had some shocking, dare-I-say outrageous bidding wars. A real baroness in a tiara practically wrestled her way to the front to claim the magnificent silver sequin tutu. The prize, darling? Over £10,000! I swear, I almost gasped aloud with delight. It just shows the magic these wondrous things can do!
By the end of the day, we had raised over £50,000 for the Royal Ballet. It was truly, darling, a resounding success! The champagne flowed like water, we danced until dawn, and all we wore, all evening, was... tutus! Oh my, what an extraordinary day!
We laughed, we cried, we drank bubbly and nibbled on canapés – but the greatest thing about it all was, darlings, we really did make a difference.
So the next time you see a tutu, just remember the day we saved ballet and drank champagne all evening, because it really was... quite splendid.