Bianka keeps the corner table

The coat is from 1962, the gloves are older, and the smile is entirely her own. Bianka collects vintage clothes the way other people collect first editions, and wears them with no hint of costume: a nipped waist, a silk scarf knotted low at the throat, heels that tap softly across a hotel lobby. She stands 165 cm, curvy and composed, her light brown hair falling long with ends that summer has turned almost gold, and her hazel eyes move between green and amber depending on the lamps.

What makes her memorable is attention. She listens properly, recalls the name of the colleague you grumbled about, and notices when your glass wants water rather than more wine. In her early twenties, she has an old-fashioned warmth that feels rare in a city this quick, and her English is soft and unhurried. Cooking is her private passion, pasta rolled by hand on a Sunday afternoon, and wine is the subject that makes her lean across the table: she tastes, considers, and describes a glass so vividly that you find yourself tasting it twice.

In Belgravia her favourite dining room is Il Pampero, inside The Hari on Chesham Place, a room small enough to feel like supper at a friend's house. She opens the list at its final pages, where the curious bottles tend to live, and orders the plainest pasta on the menu to judge the kitchen by it. The walk home through Belgrave Square is slow, her arm through yours, the white terraces pale under the street lamps.

Home for Bianka is Knightsbridge, minutes from the hotels along Sloane Street and around Hyde Park Corner. A supper like this suits the four hour dinner date; every format and figure appears on the rates page, and Rosie will happily find the table.