We generally think of British royalty as a stodgy, formal set. But in his recently published memoir, "Redeeming Features," designer Nicholas Haslam (also a distant cousin to Princess Diana) shows a more candid side of not just the royal family but also rock royalty like Mick Jagger.

According to Sebastian Shakespeare, a reviewer for London's Evening Standard, "His book offers the most eloquent proof that name-dropping has come of age."

Lest you think this is an insult, Shakespeare points out that social networking sites like Facebook have made name-dropping a trendy cyber-game. And Haslam seems to be the champ.

In an excerpt published by The Daily Beast, Haslam manages to make casual references to lunches in the 1960s with Margaret Case, Kitty Miller and Cordelia Biddle Robinson as well as some time spent hiding out with the Duchess of Windsor.

But some of his best material is his dish on the wedding of Princess Diana to Prince Charles.

Haslam didn't design Di's dress, but he did design the decor for the bridal salon in which the soon-to-be Princess of Wales would have her gown fittings. As he noted, "[I]it must have been difficult, at the final fitting, for Diana to tell where my decor ended and her frock began."

The wedding itself was so glamorous that the guests watched the film footage of it an hour after it occurred. And this is the early 1980s, so it's not like today where someone busts out a digital camera and folks gather around. Haslam writes it was "the most extraordinary sight imaginable."

That's not Haslam's only brush with royalty at a fabulous party. In his Duchess of Windsor anecdote, Haslam arrives early to a party in the Waldorf Towers and finds the Duchess equally reluctant to walk in before the scheduled time. The pair hide out in the dark in the housemaid's cupboard (per the Duchess's suggestion) and swap gossip until they feel ready to make their entrance -- the Duchess wearing black satin gloves and Haslam no doubt in some outrageously stylish get-up. (He was a contributing editor to Vogue, after all.)

It seems there are few 20th-century icons that Haslam doesn't know or trends in which he didn't participate. According to the excerpt from "Redeeming Features," "Andy Warhol, writing later about the period in his first autobiography, credits me with bringing the English 'look' to New York, with my short Italian jackets, pointed shoes, and the curtain lace with which I improvised frilled shirt cuffs under my jackets. I used to stick it on with Speed Sew glue."

Warhol claimed that we all get our 15 minutes of fame, but Haslam seems to have found a way to make his last considerably longer.

Tell us: Whose memoir do you most want to read?

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