A Brideshead visit out East

London, or more accurately Shoreditch, is having a Twenties moment. Perhaps it's the Brideshead effect, the new film having inspired followers to dream of spires and throw on their cricket whites along with lashings of Brylcreem.

Or maybe it's the parlous, near-1929 doomsday feeling reverberating from the City. Either way, this elegant moment was on clear display at the opening last week of new East End club The Last Days of Decadence.

I tend to be nervous about venturing to Hoxton, having always laboured under the belief that it's the kind of place you need to go wearing your jersey backwards or some kind of novelty hat to be accepted. "Don't fidget with your BlackBerry," said my friend Tash as we tiptoed along Shoreditch High Street. "That's not cool, it gives us away."

The first sign, in fact, that we hadn't properly entered into the riotous spirit of things was on approaching the "bouncer" — a flapper girl wearing a fur stole with jaunty feathers poking from her hair-band. She ushered us past Art Deco-stained glass windows, where another flapper girl took our coats before turning around and sipping bright orange Magners cider from a champagne flute. This one had neat, Louise Brooks hair but a somewhat incongruous nose-pierce. Post-modern Brideshead, perhaps?

"Look at that!" squeaked Tash inside as a boy dressed in white-tie sauntered by — clutching a teddy-bear. Indeed, had Sebastian Flyte been there himself, armed with Aloysius, I imagine he would have enjoyed the dissolute scene.

Downstairs it was dark, with tables of people discreetly tucked into corners lending the proceedings a faintly illicit, Prohibition feel. Drinks spilled, and a warped kind of jazz blared while seemingly drugged-up flapper-girls giggled at their Charleston attempts on the dance floor.
In four-inch heels, my own Charleston attempts were shameful. I flailed about as if in pain like a wounded giraffe but the great thing about Shoreditch is that it welcomes all-comers. You wouldn't look out of place wearing just one shoe because it's, like, so ironic. You simply must have hair that looks like you cut it with your eyes closed.

Frankly, it's a welcome relief from the current gloom. For those seeking the same, I recommend a hearty dose of the East End. Just leave the BlackBerry at home — and don't forget your teddy bear.