The Financial Times celebrated its 125th anniversary last night with a cocktail party at Claridges to launch a book* of its lunch interviews.
Lunch with the FT is a mainstay of the FT's weekend issue, having provided many an intriguing interview since the first one in April 1994 (with Marco Pierre White).
The FT's editor, Lionel Barber, told of some surprising incidents down the years, including one with Yuko Tojo, granddaughter of the Japanese prime minister hanged after the second world war. She brought his remains with her to the lunch table.
One with Michael O'Leary, the Ryanair boss, in December 2009 provided superb copy. He insisted it took place in his office and he handed the interviewer, Pilita Clark, "a sad-looking bagel containing a pile of pesto, tomato and cucumber."
Aside from the personality of the interviewee and the choice of restaurant, the added joy for journalists is to see how much, or how little, was spent. So clever of the FT to make expenses so transparent.
One persistent feature of the restaurant bills is the relative lack of alcohol. But Barber did tell of at least one lunch where he emerged into blinding sunlight at 4.30pm.
I came across one disgruntled person at the party, a high-profile PR for a high-profile media honcho. "There are 52 lunches in that book but my client isn't there," he lamented. "How could they omit him?"
As Barber points out in the book's introduction it was a tough choice to select 52 from 800, so some excellent interviews missed the cut.
*Lunch with the FT: 52 classic interviews is published by Portfolio/Penguin for £20 (the price of an average starter, I note)
