She’s the niece of designer Daphne Guinness, and so it’s perhaps of little surprise that Lady Mary Charteris celebrated her 39th birthday in style last week.
The socialite marked the occasion from the penthouse of a trendy bar in Shoreditch, London, with some of her nearest and dearest, including Rita Ora‘s filmmaker husband, Taika Waititi.
The model and DJ, who is the daughter of James Charteris, 13th Earl of Wemyss and 9th Earl of March, and the Hon Catherine Ingrid Guinness, shared a snap kissing her BFF, model Poppy Delevingne, while Jessica Clarke, co-founder of supplement brand Mother Made, watched on.
She shared a glimpse of the party on Instagram, including a loved-up video with her husband, Robbie Furze – but revealed a blunder meant she had a limited number of images.
‘At my birthday party, I was taking photos with a new camera I had been given as a birthday present, only to realise the next day it had no memory card, so these are all the photos I took on my phone, which weren’t many.’
She nonetheless managed to get some glamorous pictures, including one of herself posing next to her extravagant gold cake, shaped like lips and featuring an iced figurine of herself on the DJ decks.
The socialite concluded the social media post by thanking organisers, friends and family, writing: ‘I love my friends so much it hurts’.
It comes after Lady Mary complained that her £1,000-a-night stay at a five-star resort in Sri Lanka had become a holiday from hell due to a building site next door.
Lady Mary Charteris celebrated her 39th birthday in style at the penthouse of a bar in Shoreditch, London
Lady Mary took to TikTok to air her grievances about the construction taking place next door to the luxurious Ahu Bay hotel in the coastal town Ahungalla.
She said she had travelled to the tropical paradise from her London home to recover from a sore throat.
But the mother-of-one was horrified when she saw diggers and workmen ’20 steps’ from her beachfront room.
She raged: ‘I am tired of being ripped off when I go on holiday.
‘I have come to a hot country to try and get my voice back because since I’ve been ill, my voice just has not been the same and I need to do some singing. I thought I’d come and visit my brother in a nice, warm country. I paid good money for a hotel. And there is a building site next to the hotel.’
In the video, Lady Mary pans across the pristine palm tree-lined beach before showing the construction work, complete with scaffolding, building materials and workmen.
She said: ‘That is a digger there. It is moving heavy rubble all day. There is a pneumatic drill all day. There was nowhere on the website where the hotel mentioned this.
‘I understand that it happens sometimes… but you need to be warned. As a paying customer, I want to be warned, because then it’s my decision as to whether I stayed at the hotel.’
The model and DJ kissed her friend Poppy Delevingne – as Jessica Clarke, co-founder of supplement brand, Mother Made, watched on
Rita Ora’s husband, filmmaker and actor Taika Waititi, posed with the socialite at her birthday party
Mary’s aunt, English fashion designer and socialite Daphne Guinness, was also at the glamorous event
The socialite, whose grandfather, Jonathan Guinness, 3rd Baron Moyne, was a colleague of Andy Warhol, said when she challenged the hotel staff, they told her they don’t warn guests ‘because sometimes it doesn’t make noise’.
‘I said, so what if it doesn’t make noise? It’s ugly!’ she added. ‘Look: beautiful beach, beautiful beach, beautiful beach… Ugly building site! Not cool. This happened to me before when I rented an Airbnb – there was a massive building site next door.
‘From now on, if ever I stay anywhere – I highly recommend you do this too – wherever you’re staying, whether it’s an Airbnb, a hotel, a house, whatever, just ask: is there a building site anywhere nearby?’
Not all TikTok commenters were sympathetic.
One wrote: ‘If this was the worst problem I had today, this week, this year – I think I’d be OK’, to which Lady Mary hit back: ‘Did I say this was the worst problem I had?’
Ahu Bay is an exclusive hideaway with 13 rooms and two standalone villas.
The boutique resort, located on Ahungalla Point between two secluded bays on Sri Lanka’s south-west coast, charges £865 per night for a Bay View Pool Residence – one of its most exclusive three-bedroom villas featuring a private plunge pool and extensive gardens.
