Afternoon Tea at Fortnum's

The tradition of Afternoon Tea dates back more than 200 years when, struck by hunger pangs somewhere between lunch and dinner, the Duchess of Bedford invited her friends over for tea and ‘a light refreshment’ in her rooms at Woburn Abbey. Word of her teatime innovation spread, and on her return to London, ‘Afternoon Tea’ was deliciously inescapable.

Now, some two centuries later, Fortnum's has become the undisputed home of this most uplifting and fulfilling of rituals -- famous the world over for the precisely-cut sandwiches, fresh-baked cakes, unsurpassable scones and tea, glorious tea we serve in our Diamond Jubilee Tea Salon (opened by Her Majesty the Queen, no less, in 2012) every day.