Harcourt Vane Vol. 17 No. 3

Practices

Six practices,
no departments

We are organised around the kinds of argument we have, not around the industries our clients work in. A partner leads every matter and stays on it. Nothing is passed down a floor.

Contents

  1. 01Commercial disputes
  2. 02International arbitration
  3. 03Art and cultural property
  4. 04Private wealth and trusts
  5. 05Regulatory and investigations
  6. 06Reputation and media

01Practice

Commercial disputes

We act in the disputes a business would rather not have: a contract that failed on delivery, a joint venture that stopped speaking, a warranty claim that arrived four days before the limitation date. Most of our work is in the Commercial Court and the Business and Property Courts, and about a third of it settles before disclosure. We do not treat that as a defeat.

Counsel’s bench in an empty courtroom: a tied bundle, a reading lamp, the panelled wall beyond.
Plate 01 · Commercial disputes

Representative matters

  • HV/2024/117Acting for the majority shareholder in a £62m unfair prejudice petition arising from a family printing group.
  • HV/2023/041Defending a specialist insurer in a Commercial Court claim on the construction of an aggregation clause.
  • HV/2022/206Advising a listed logistics group on a warranty claim following the acquisition of a Rotterdam depot.

Lead partners

02Practice

International arbitration

Seats in London, Paris, Singapore and Geneva; hearings wherever the tribunal sits. Our arbitration practice is built on charterparties, offtake agreements and construction claims, and on the enforcement work that follows an award nobody intends to pay. We keep the same small team from request to enforcement.

A long marble corridor in one-point perspective, lit by a tall arched window at the far end.
Plate 02 · International arbitration

Representative matters

  • HV/2025/012Acting for a shipping group in a USD 240m LCIA arbitration concerning a long-term charterparty.
  • HV/2024/088Representing a Gulf contractor in an ICC arbitration over a delayed desalination plant.
  • HV/2021/154Resisting enforcement of a Stockholm award against a state-owned energy trader in the Commercial Court.

Lead partners

  • Rosalind Achebe
  • Anand Mehta

03Practice

Art and cultural property

Objects outlive the people who argue about them. We act for collectors, dealers, foundations and public museums on title and restitution, on attribution and authenticity, on export licensing and on the consignment agreements that go wrong quietly. Tobias Lindgren sits on the Institute of Art and Law’s advisory panel.

The practice in full

A museum store: sliding picture racks receding into the dark, a stencilled transit crate in the foreground.
Plate 03 · Art and cultural property

Representative matters

  • HV/2026/031Advising a Geneva foundation on the restitution of a 1912 Schiele drawing sold under duress in 1938.
  • HV/2024/173Acting for a dealer in a Chancery claim over the attribution of a Neapolitan altarpiece.
  • HV/2023/119Advising a national museum on the export licensing of a Anglo-Saxon hoard found in Suffolk.

Lead partners

  • Tobias Lindgren
  • Sam Kowalczyk

04Practice

Private wealth and trusts

Trusts fail for ordinary reasons: a letter of wishes nobody read, a trustee who stopped asking questions, a second family. We advise trustees, protectors and beneficiaries in Jersey, Guernsey, the Cayman Islands and the Chancery Division, and we draft the governance that keeps the next generation out of court.

Detail of an open ledger: ruled columns and entries in a copperplate hand, raking light from the left.
Plate 04 · Private wealth and trusts

Representative matters

  • HV/2025/067Defending a family office in Chancery proceedings concerning the administration of a Jersey trust.
  • HV/2024/009Advising a protector on the removal of a professional trustee of a £310m Cayman structure.
  • HV/2022/141Acting for beneficiaries in a Beddoe application before the Royal Court of Guernsey.

Lead partners

  • Julian Vane
  • Beatrice Fairley

05Practice

Regulatory and investigations

An investigation is a document exercise before it is anything else. We run internal reviews that hold up when the regulator arrives, prepare individuals for compelled interviews, and argue about privilege early rather than late. Miriam Sassoon spent six years at the Financial Conduct Authority before joining the firm.

A wall of hand-labelled archive boxes on steel shelving in a strip-lit room.
Plate 05 · Regulatory and investigations

Representative matters

  • HV/2026/004Representing a senior manager in an FCA enforcement investigation under the Senior Managers Regime.
  • HV/2024/052Conducting a privileged internal review for a payments business following a whistleblower report.
  • HV/2020/188Advising a construction group on a deferred prosecution agreement negotiated with the SFO.

Lead partners

  • Miriam Sassoon
  • Inès Moreau

06Practice

Reputation and media

Most of this practice is pre-publication: reading a draft at nine on a Friday evening and saying what is defensible and what is not. When a claim does come, it is heard in the Media and Communications List, and the remedy that matters is usually speed. We act for claimants and for publishers, though never in the same week.

A folded newspaper on a table under window light, its columns blurred to grey.
Plate 06 · Reputation and media

Representative matters

  • HV/2025/098Acting for a broadcaster in a defamation claim brought by a housebuilder over a safety investigation.
  • HV/2023/077Obtaining an interim injunction restraining publication of confidential medical information.
  • HV/2021/033Advising a family on a data protection claim following a local authority disclosure error.

Lead partners

  • Henry Okonkwo