This is the month when the well-heeled swap linen suits for Burberry trenches and tuck away the rosé until next June. It is, once again, la rentrée — that annual return from summer’s suspended animation to the churn of school, work, politics, and business.
For the global elite — many of whom spent August marooned on boats or private islands — September signals a return to reality. Once, this late-summer ritual was largely a continental affair: the post-beach return to Brussels bureaucracy or Parisian corporate intrigue. Today, it’s a global phenomenon, albeit one reserved for those blissfully unbothered by such mundane constraints as annual leave.
Hedge fund managers reappear in Mayfair boardrooms, Gulf royals descend on Geneva for multilateral talks, and Silicon Valley VCs swap the Amalfi Coast for AI governance summits in D.C.
In London, aficionados gather in St. James’s galleries, catching up ahead of the season’s official start with Art Basel. Oligarch offspring jostle for tables at Maison Estelle before trotting off to Harvey Nichols for yet another piercing. Meanwhile, freshers clutching Liberty washbags and monogrammed trunks make their tentative arrivals at Oxford, Cambridge, Edinburgh, or Durham. But this year’s return feels half-hearted — and it’s not just the relentless rain. Tube strikes, far-right rallies, and the continual chaos of domestic politics have disrupted the usual smooth transition into autumn for the estimated 300,000 ultra-wealthy families who call the city home.
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‘After three weeks cooped up with them on a boat, I was so looking forward to handing the children over to school and the nannies,’ laments a Notting Hill mother over matcha and coconut lattes in Westbourne Grove. I don’t feel too sorry for her — knowing, as I do, that the “boat” in question was a 65-metre Benetti superyacht — but it’s a refrain I’ve heard more than once.
With strikes disrupting the seamless handover from school to nannies and tutors, the first full week back has been unusually hard for some parents. A lucky few — with live-in staff — managed last-minute arrangements, often at the price of generous overtime. Others were forced to spend yet more time with their children, frequently stuck in traffic during the school run. Quelle horreur!
It all adds to the hollowed-out feel of London’s once-vibrant gilded life, following the billionaire exodus spurred by changes to the non-dom regime.
‘Two years ago, this place was packed with people who had both capital and connections,’ notes one financier, glancing around a nearly empty restaurant in a members-only gym in Chelsea. From our table near the window, I looked out at the Chanel boutique across the street.
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‘I used to walk in here, order an espresso and do half a day’s business without booking a single meeting — because everyone was already in London.’
Now, he’s a member of The Wilde, a new private club in downtown Milan attempting to recreate the energy of early-2010s London. He pays £4,000 a year for the privilege. The irony, of course, is that its founder — Gary Landesberg, also behind the Arts Club on Dover Street—and creative director Alasdhair Willis (Stella McCartney’s husband), were once at the heart of the very London scene now being imitated abroad.
And yet — here he is. Back in Blighty – and not just for a fleeting visit.
Despite his complaints, he’s relocating his latest venture — another AI start-up — to the UK. ‘The taxes are obnoxious,’ he concedes, ‘but the UK still offers unmatched protections under Common Law and remains a global leader in scientific innovation, especially in domain-specific AI.’
He’s not wrong.
‘While governments squabbled over how to regulate artificial intelligence, the private sector spent the summer pouring money into it,’ says a private equity professional based in the City. According to Bloomberg, global private capital investment in AI and quantum infrastructure surpassed $410 billion in the first half of 2025 — a 38 per cent year-on-year increase, much of it from the Gulf and Southeast Asia.
‘London remains the traditional meeting ground for such disparate interests,’ he says with a grin. ‘So don’t be surprised if it becomes the centre of the action in the second half of 2025. After all, where Air Force One goes, the Gulfstreams follow,’ he adds, referring to the U.S. President Donald Trump’s own return to Capitol Hill via Windsor Castle.
So yes, la rentrée 2025 has begun — in soggy, strike-stricken London, where the food is overpriced and restaurant waitlists are endless. But this year, the annual ritual marks more than just the end of summer.
Perhaps it also signals the beginning of a new season—of renewal and reinvention.
