Roles we place
Butlers
The butler is the household’s face to the world: at the door, at the table and on the telephone. In most of the houses we place with, he or she is also the person who knows where everything is.
| Usually engaged by | Households that entertain often, or keep a cellar or a collection |
|---|---|
| Live-in | About half |
| Our search | Usually six to eight weeks |
| Placed in 2025 | Eleven |
The role today
Very few households now keep a butler in the old sense, with footmen beneath him and a pantry to rule. Many more keep one in the modern sense: a senior member of staff who runs the service of the house, its table, its door and its guests, and often its wine, its silver and its art as well. In smaller households the butler is also the house manager, and we place the role under whichever title the household prefers.
The butlers we place are responsible, typically, for:
- Service at table, from breakfast for two to dinner for forty, and the briefing of temporary staff when there are more guests than hands.
- The door, the telephone and the household’s correspondence with the outside world.
- Valeting for the principal and for guests: packing, unpacking, pressing, the care of shoes.
- The cellar: its records, its temperature, its purchases and its insurance schedule.
- The silver, the china and the glass, their care and their inventory.
- The arrangements for a guest’s stay, from the flowers in the room to the car at the airport.
Service, in practice
Every butler we place has laid a formal table under Neil Fairbanks’s eye, and most of them could do it in the dark. The plan below is the one we teach. Households vary it, and a good butler asks before assuming otherwise.
Who we look for
We look for at least five years in private service or in the service of a fine hotel or a club, and at least two in a household. We look for a calm voice, a good memory for faces and names, and a horror of being noticed. We look for butlers who can tell a 1990 from a 1991 by the label and who would never mention it at the table.
Several of the butlers we have placed trained in England. Most trained here, some of them with us. We do not mind where a butler learned the work, only how well.
The butlers’ module
The Larchcombe course includes a three-day butlers’ module, taught by Neil Fairbanks on the top floor of Tarrant Place: service at table, valeting, the cellar, silver and its care, the door and the telephone, and the conduct of a household when it has guests. It is open, without charge, to any butler or footman registered with us. Its dates are on the training page.