Amanda Illing discusses the process of building a modern barristers’ chambers
Last week, by chance I opened a box that had been untouched in our old basement for many years. Inside was a treasure chest of barristers’ chambers’ history – the diaries! Eight huge, beautiful red and blue leather-bound diaries from 1980 to 1987. Back then, barristers’ livelihoods (their cases, hearings, court location, solicitor instructing and agreed fees) would be manually recorded day by day in this one diary and used by all the ‘clerks’ (often thrown across the room) in order to engage a barrister for a piece of work or a court appearance.
