Raising the bar

Who you know is everything in the feverish world of London's clubland. To avoid the bore of long queues, the whim of a clipboard Nazi and the humiliation of paying an entrance fee (very uncool), there are six names you need to drop. But it's not the owners or the DJs who hold the power these days. Instead, it's a small group of fixers who run specific "nights" in the capital's most coveted venues.

NICK HOUSE, 31
Everyone wants to know more about the former Citibank trader who has been dubbed the most important crowd-mixer in London. House (he calls every female he meets "darling") is blessed with the most enviable asset in today's world of party-organising - a colossal database. He oversees 20 "nights" a week in London and has been the man behind the crowds for events hosted by the Rolling Stones and Natalie Imbruglia as well as parties for film premieres, the Mobo awards and this summer's Take That! end-of-tour bash.

So what is the coolest place in London right now? "Silver," he says, without hesitation. "Even by my standards it's off-the-scale cool. The walls are covered in gigantic silver cushions and the VIP room has beds with ceiling screens." Sienna Miller, Diane Kruger and a beefy list of royalty and rock stars are lined up to make it the venue du jour. The music will be dirtyhousehiphoprock - whatever that is.

Every Thursday to Saturday more than 7,000 people are on a Nick House guestlist somewhere across the capital. If you can't wangle your way into Silver, you could try Umbaba on Thursdays, Kensington Roof Gardens and Paper on a Friday and Mamilanjis on Saturdays. www.nickhouseentertainment.com

TATUM MAZZILLI, 26
The half-Belgian, half-Italian Mazzilli family has been dubbed the Addams Family of the fashion world. They own the outré fashion label Voyage, and friends call Tatum a "fun, wild, sexy, aristocratic nutcase". She has acted as a stylist for Johnny Depp, Christina Aguilera and Pink.

Clients soon began asking the madcap Tatum to organise their parties, so she fused her two great loves, "partying and dressing up", to create an evening called Fashion Overdose. "We target the fashion glitterati and the superglamorous," she says. Her "nights" are held in Aura, Pangaea and Mintleaf and also St Tropez, Paris and New York. Regulars include De Niro, J-Lo, Jade Jagger and Prince William. www.fashionoverdose.net

JAMES MINTER, 36
This former Navy officer is behind the renaissance of the Vaults (better known as the Adam Street Club), which inspired Fagin's Den in Oliver Twist and was a hotbed for sinning thespians such as Laurence Olivier, John Gielgud and Richard Harris. "Minter has excelled where others have failed," says one Adam Street regular. "He's got exclusivity but managed to bypass snobbery."

The Vaults have been described as an "entrepreneur's oasis" for anyone trying to escape more poncy W1 venues. Everyone from Stephen Fry to Scarlett Johansson has been down to the Vaults. Salman Rushdie has lectured there on free speech, and Jimmy Carr has run comedy nights. Polo-playing, party-loving Minter served in Iraq during the first Gulf War and was involved in the midnight ceremony handover of Hong Kong in 1997. After leaving the service he joined his father's offices on the Strand to help run the family property company but found it "dull". He then set about rekindling Adam Street. www.adamstreet.co.uk

LILLY LADJEVARDI, 25
This vivacious party girl is behind the success of nights at the notoriously exclusive Mayfair club Annabel's, where she is trying to inject some chutzpah into the society haunt. Her parents fled Iran during the revolution and settled in New York, where Lilly was educated.

After graduating in anthropology, she worked as a researcher for a US foreign policy think-tank but left when her boss was killed by a bomb in Iraq. She then apprenticed for an interior designer who did "fancy New York apartments and ostentatious country houses in the Hamptons", before travelling to India to be taught by gurus of Indian music and native dance. "Kathak dancers were my favourite," she says. "It's all about stamping your feet and making beautiful gestures with your arms. I still use the moves when I'm on Annabel's dance floor."