The Portland: The A-list's choice

Why do so many stars have their babies at the Portland Hospital? From the outside, it looks like a functional, late 20th century office block or tourist hotel, not the sort of place to lure those for whom money is no object.

But once through the sliding doors in Great Portland Street in the West End, you begin to understand. From the fresh flowers and oak panelling in the reception area you are drawn in to the quiet luxury that has led some wits to dub it the Portland Hotel.

If, like Liz Hurley, you are seriously wealthy, you will probably be in one of the most expensive suites rather than simply a room with a bathroom that those referred by health insurance companies might be offered (not that those aren't luxurious, too).

While you shouldn't expect opulence - there are no heavy curtains or giltedged mirrors - the service offered would not seem out of place in a five-star hotel. Decorated in calming pastel shades, the most expensive suites have a large living area where you can entertain your friends away from prying eyes, with a good bar list - from £2.85 for a Budweiser up to £75 for a bottle of Bollinger Special Cuvèe - to keep them happy. Hugh Grant will have a ball.

Liz will also be able to offer her close friends and family something to eat from the fabulous daily menu, which would not be sniffed at had it been offered at The Ivy. And if she's peckish at 3am, there's always a club sandwich from room service.

Breakfast is a choice of Continental, full English or kosher, from £5.95 to £9. The menu for lunch and dinner changes each day. For lunch, Liz could indulge in a starter of tempura fried tiger-prawns with chilli sauce, followed by pan-fried salmon with an orange and tomato concasse and dill dressing. Then for pudding, a praline toffee cheesecake.

If there's any appetite left by evening, there'll no doubt be a terrine of chicken and dates served with apple chutney followed by pan-fried calves' liver served with a pesto mash, crispy bacon and tomato-basil jus. Pudding could include chocolate and banana mousse, or there's cheese and biscuits.

Most importantly, Liz would have been guaranteed one-to-one midwife care throughout the delivery and, once she returned to her room with little Damian, she, like other guests before her, may well have been offered a celebration champagne dinner - possibly duck patè served with warm brioche and hazelnut dressing followed by griddled loin of tuna served with a ginger and cream sauce. The tablecloth would have been, of course, in the appropriate colour - blue for a boy.

Whether it is the dining experience or the medical care that persuaded Liz to shelve her original plan of giving birth at nearby St John and St Elizabeth's - a far more alternative experience, complete with birthing pool and aromatherapy oils - we still don't know. But she's in good company: Victoria Beckham, Lady Helen Taylor, Anneka Rice, Jerry Hall, Jemima Khan, Pamela Stephenson, Lady Sarah Chatto, Rachel Hunter, Spice Girl Mel B, Michelle Lineker, Benazir Bhutto, Trudi Styler, Patsy Kensit, Victoria Wood and Julie Walters prove that London's Portland has become the hospital of choice for the celebrity classes.

One plus - though Liz may not have seen it like that - is that an extra bed is provided if you want your man to stay the night. With purported father Steve Bing hidden away in Hollywood, maybe Hugh Grant spent the night receiving the dozens of bouquets, telegrams and hand-delivered cards that began arriving as soon as the announcement was made.

And just in case Hugh got a little too excited about the entire course of events, doctors would have kept a close eye on him too - the spare bed is fully wired to keep essential functions such as heartbeat and blood pressure monitored.

Liz, like all who stay at the Portland, had her own bathroom, cable TV with a multitude of channels, all the papers, a free teddy bear for the baby, a birth announcement in a broadsheet newspaper and, if it doesn't affect any photographic deals, little Damian will have his very own picture on the Portland website.

It is the care given, says the Portland, that is the real heart of the hospital. On any one day, about 60 of the country's top consultants will be in and out looking after their wellheeled patients.

The hospital's marketing manager, Helen Taylor, says: "Firstly, it's the quality of care that attracts people, and then it's the fact that it's a private room, your partner can stay with you, you can have visitors when you like, you're not on a big long ward with lots of screaming babies - and you've got time to recover.

"You can have all your care in one place, so you're not going off to one place for your scan and somewhere else for your ante-natal classes."

The hospital has four operating theatres, including emergency facilities for Caesareans with fulltime theatre staff and music of your choice, and there are five delivery rooms with mobile epidural equipment available. If Liz opted for an epidural it will have set her back another £450.

A pool is available for water births, but this has to be ordered in advance and costs extra. It doesn't seem to be a popular option among the stars, who tend to opt for "John and Lizzie's" if they want a more natural birth.

It's safe to assume that the state-of-the-art scanners the Portland prides itself on will have given Liz weeks ago an incredibly clear image of what Damian looked like. The £200,000 Porsche-made machines which, uniquely, give a clear three dimensional picture of a baby's face inside the womb, are so popular the hospital has a waiting list to use them.

For new mothers, the most vital factor for a quick recovery after birth is the luxury of sleep. In NHS hospitals you probably won't get this. When baby wakes in the night, you will have to feed or change her. At the Portland, nurses work round-the-clock to settle the newborn, making sure mums get the rest they need.

Oh, and Damian will now be the proud member of one of London's most exclusive clubs, the Portly Panda Club, which means he'll get a quarterly newsletter about the hospital, a panda soft toy, birthday cards and an invitation to an annual party.

But nice as these touches are, it doesn't disguise the fact that it all costs an awful lot of money. At the top end, you are unlikely to come away with a bill for less than £7,000. An elective Caesarean for non-medical reasons costs £3,256 - and that's just for the first night. There are five classes of room and extra nights range in price from £694 up to £1,244.

But the good news for Liz is that she'll get a discount if she comes back for subsequent babies. Though whether millionaires like her really care whether they get 40 quid off is another matter.

Emma Forbes: My Portland experience