Posh tots
Tanya Gold
‘When Brooklyn Beckham wears a new outfit we get telephone calls asking who designed it,’ says Dina Kingsman, the head buyer at the Harrods Baby Department. ‘And we sell out.’ She waves calmly at the photographs of designer babywear splattered across her desk. ‘In the 1980s it was all about trainers,’ she says. ‘In the 1990s it was labels. Now it is baby labels.’ Yes, she says, nodding at me, Designer Babywear has hit London, with the soft thud of a nappy falling on to a Notting Hill floor. ‘It is an exciting time for babywear.’ My sister is expecting a child and I need to show I love it. First I invade Gucci Baby and stare at an object. ‘That is for dogs, Madam,’ says the saleswoman. My sister is not expecting a dog, so I examine a silver rattle (£170) and some miniature trainers (£125). I even try on the Gucci Papoose and, oh cruel call of marketing, I want it, even though I am childless and even if I were not it would only last for six months. (You cannot carry a 12-year-old in a papoose, even if it is willing.) Opposite Gucci is Hermès (nappy bag £1,130, eponymous silver spoon £245, cashmere robe £540) and Louis Vuitton and his Most Wanted Nappy Bag. ‘It is the only one left in London,’ I am told as it is laid out before me, like John the Baptist’s head.
Next I go to Selfridges Baby, which is on the third floor because babies are fat and do not deserve to be near International Designers. The first thing I notice about Selfridges Baby is that there aren’t any babies. Instead, I see second wives in mink earmuffs and women whose internal organs are wearing Stella McCartney gazing at a feeding bottle that says ‘Baby Dior’. ‘Ooh,’ gurgles one. ‘Ahh,’ moans the other.
In Harriet Street I find Babylon itself, Baby Dior. I always thought Baby Dior was a joke because I once met a woman with a dog called Baby Dior and it had its own website. But in this perfect recreation of a 1950s couture salon the manageress tells me that Christian Dior began to design baby clothes for Princess Caroline of Monaco’s children and found he could n’t stop. I am shown a silk christening gown for £838 (not a misprint!) with a fabric rose. Then there is a bib that says Baby Dior (£23) and Baby Dior socks (also £23), which I consider buying. It is all beautiful. And it is all useless. It is like dressing penguins in jewellery — it looks interesting, but what it is for? How will your baby applaud your sacrifice? Will it throw up? But I am getting it: if you want a chic, understated baby, go to Ralph Lauren. If you want a Burberry Baby, throw Burberry at it and watch. If you want a baby that looks like a cushion, take it to Roberto Cavalli and deny that childbirth is a tough and dirty business. Vomit isn’t vomit when it lands on Hermès. Poo becomes satin when it falls on to Dior. And how can you feel pain when Baby Chloé is waiting?
At Harrods I find that the head buyer, Dina, is pregnant, as though she is an advert for her department. I look at the tiny rompers pinned to the wall — they are very creepy — and she says, ‘It’s cool to have a baby and it’s cool to have them dressed like this. If the baby looks beautiful, the mother feels good. It’s the wow factor meets the ahh factor.’ So that is how you end up with a leopard-print baby: wow + ahh = agh. ‘If Dad wears Armani, the son will follow suit,’ she adds. ‘If Mum wears Chloé, her daughter can match.’ There is an epidemic of fashion awareness, she says, fuelled by marketing budgets, celebrity births and Closer magazine. Dina shows me photographs of next season’s new arrivals — Chloé, Missoni and Cavalli are all moving into babywear. Then on to the repulsive Roberto Cavalli leopard-print line, and when I have stopped choking I talk to Lucy Sykes Rellie, who sells designer clothes to Manhattan babies. She says Dior Baby happened because women are having babies later, ‘when they have more money to spend. And parents like to project their own sense of style on to their kids.’ Her Lucy Sykes Hobo canvas-luxe diaper bag, she says, ‘was featured on Oprah’s O-List and sold out from Scoop in a week — although several buyers did not even have kids’. But why, Lucy, why? Why aren’t the monsters in coal sacking and discarded M&S bags, like I was? ‘Having babies, and our friends having babies,’ she says, ‘makes us feel much better in this dark and uncertain world. Why not splash a little cash to add to the wondrous beauty of the thing?’ I also corner Catherine O’Dolan, the editor of Junior, the glossy magazine for babies. She has actually seen next season’s Roberto Cavalli leopard-print vest (and matching pants) and his leopard-print bottle warmer (with gold diamante wings). ‘But babies have no respect for labels,’ she counsels. ‘Your baby will puke on Primark. Your baby will puke on Prada.’ In the end I bought a Baby Dior dummy for my sister’s bump to chew on. I hated it but I bought it anyway. Indoctrinated by propaganda, I picture my sister’s baby and the love I will bear its little face. How can I leave it behind with a sub-standard, non designer dummy, despised, hopeless, shut out? This baby cannot be a Gap Baby, a Tesco Baby or, indeed, a Real Baby. It is too late for that. No, I think, clutching the designer dummy, almost longing to suck on it myself — it can only be Dior. Baby.
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