“As a Scottish brand, Burns Night is deeply personal to us,” said Leeanne Hundleby, who founded luxury leather goods brand Strathberry with her husband, Guy, in 2013. “It’s a celebration of who we are—of culture, storytelling, and friendships that are formed and strengthened around the table.”
Burns Night is an annual celebration of the Scottish national poet Robert “Rabbie” Burns, who lived during the second half of the 18th century. It’s a convivial holiday that “always falls on Burns’s birthday, January 25, and is an occasion for many formal and informal ‘Burns suppers,’ in Scotland and throughout the world,” notes Patricia Allerston, head of European and Scottish art and chief curator at the National Galleries of Scotland. As for how it’s celebrated? “Its main components include the Burns Supper, a meal consisting of haggis, neeps, and tatties, and the focal point of the evening is the Address to a Haggis—accompanied by a whisky toast,” adds Kirsty Hassard, a senior curator at the V&A Dundee.
Celebrating Burns is one of Leeanne’s most cherished winter traditions—which is why, earlier this week, she and Guy decided to open their family home to friends of the brand, new and old, to partake in a contemporary spin on a Burns supper.
The evening began with a driver zipping us across the cobbled streets of Bruntsfield, the leafy neighborhood on the Southern side of Edinburgh that the Hundlebys call home. (In typical Scottish fashion, droplets were sprayed across the windshield, the moody aftermath of the day’s fierce storm.) I was bundled in with a few of the evening’s guests, including Louise Roe, founder of the homewares brand Sharland England, and Scottish actor Honor Swinton Byrne—both of whom I’d met earlier that day, wielding hammers and mallets while learning how to repair leather goods at the Strathberry atelier.
Upon arrival at the 19th-century cottage-style villa, our group followed the sound of the bagpipes cutting through the misty air, stepping through the red sandstone-walled garden. I must admit, hearing the chords unlocked a nostalgia for Scotland that I’ve felt since the day I moved back to New York from Edinburgh seven months ago. And while my time away had caused me to commit a weather faux pas (I had straightened my hair before dinner), even that couldn’t deter me from standing in the rain without an umbrella as the piper finished his stirring rendition of “Scots Wha Hae.”
On the pipes was none other than 17-year-old Egan Hundleby, the teenage son of the Strathberry co-founders, who had learned to play at Merchiston Castle School. (The rumor was that there might have been a cash bribe to get Egan to perform for us that evening, which had to keep increasing as the weather worsened. If so, it was worth every penny.)
Stepping inside from the rain, our sodden coats were taken and exchanged for sparkling glasses of Champagne, as well as delicate canapes made by the famed chef Roberta Hall, the genius behind several of Edinburgh’s most beloved institutions, including The Little Chartroom, Eleanore, and Ardfern. Ushered into the living room, we flopped onto the sofas as though we lived there, admiring books from Guy’s recent trip to Japan (Strathberry popped up in Tokyo and Osaka this year) which sat next to framed family photos (the Hundlebys have four children and recently welcomed a new giant schnauzer puppy named Lola).
Naturally, no Burns supper would be complete without a dram of whisky (spelled the Scottish way, without the added “e”), so the Hundlebys had invited Paul Malone, a brand ambassador at Glenmorangie, to lead the group through a lively three-course tasting that ended with an 18-year-old single malt and questions from the audience. When one guest asked whether the weather has any effect on the flavor of whiskies (as it does for wine), the answer was a confident no. “It’s always ‘pishing down’ in Scotland, so you better hope not,” said Malone, to a roar of laughter. And with a rousing chant of “sláinte,” it was time for some poetry.
As the guest of honor, Swinton Byrne—who starred in Joanna Hogg’s The Souvenir and has also appeared in A Very Royal Scandal and The Crown—kicked off with a reflection on the times. “At this chilly, often depressing time of year, Burns Night comes at a good moment,” she said. “Especially now when the world feels particularly fragmented and uncertain, it brings us together from different corners and cultures to indulge in good humor and shared values.” After a pause, she broke into a knowing smile. “And nobody accepts friends from overseas quite like the Scots.” This I knew to be true.
Turning to Burns himself, she continued: “We’re together to celebrate our national bard, a man whose creativity, tenacity, and ability to express love openly have paved the way for the rest of us to follow suit.” As she proceeded to read Burns’s poem The Cotter’s Saturday Night in her rich, sonorous voice, time was briefly suspended.
Upon its conclusion, we moved into the open kitchen with sky-high, corniced ceilings where Hall was hard at work. The table was dressed in moss and interspersed with taper candles and sculptural flowers like ranunculus and calla lilies in shades of emerald and cream; the local florist, Snapdragon, had designed the tablescape to echo the rolling hills of the Scottish Highlands.
Strathberry is a modern Scottish brand, and so the typical Burns Night menu was reimagined by Hall to reflect this sensibility. After a course of piping hot milk butter bread between sips of wild game broth, baked-in-the-shell scallops in an Arbroath smokie sauce arrived as a luxurious nod to the hearty Scottish fish stew, Cullen skink. For the main, a venison saddle was accompanied by deep-fried haggis and homemade brown sauce, while for dessert, whisky stroopwafels were topped with cardamom panna cotta.
I was sitting next to Guy—and the delightful new puppy nestled on his lap—and across from blogger and beauty brand founder, Victoria Magrath, of Inthefrow, who recalled her first meeting with Guy in 2013 in Manchester. (Guy described himself as showing up with a trunk of tartan and tweed duffles and “not a clue.”)
In the early years, Strathberry leaned away from these more stereotypically Scottish prints, but more recently, the brand has returned to its Caledonian roots with confidence. “We can now be playful about it,” Guy said, citing the recent launch of the Loch Ness Monster and Highland cow bag charms made in the same factory as the beloved Loewe penguins.
I could have sat there in the glowing candlelight and listened to these stories all night. It truly felt like I had dropped in on the annual Hundleby family Burns supper—and I wasn’t alone in feeling that way. “I felt like an honorary Scot by the end of the night,” said Roe.
This might be the magic that comes from celebrating this quintessentially Scottish holiday. “Burns Night holds such significance in Scotland and has the special ability to bring people together—both Scots and adoptive Scots alike,” added Hassard. “Its continuing relevance is down to its reinvention over time. Scottish fashion designers such as Christopher Kane and Charles Jeffrey have hosted their own Burns Nights, with their own creative flair.” Strathberry now rightfully sits among them. More than anything, I feel lucky to have been a witness to another pair of Scottish designers doing Burns their own way: with intimacy, warmth, and plenty of heart.