Escorts in South Kensington: ring the bell by Old Brompton Road, SW7

The Institut français occupies a handsome art deco building on Queensberry Place, with Ciné Lumière on the ground floor, a cinema that shows French and European films with subtitles most evenings. Around the corner the Lycée Français Charles de Gaulle fills Cromwell Road with schoolchildren by day, and a French bookshop, several patisseries and a run of bistros have grown up around it over the decades.

By night the quarter is small, calm and very walkable. Old Brompton Road carries the restaurants west towards Gloucester Road, Thurloe Place faces the V&A across the traffic, and the side streets are mews houses and white stucco.

The museums close at six, and the quarter barely notices. An early film, a long supper and the walk home past the lit dome of the Brompton Oratory is the local idea of a perfect evening.

SW7 3ER on Harrington Road is two minutes from the Institut, light and playful inside. SW7 3EG on Sumner Place hides a long garden behind its row of townhouses. SW7 5EX and SW7 5AG stand further north towards the park, SW7 5LR fills a stretch of stucco on Queen's Gate, and SW7 5BB looks across to Kensington Gardens from Hyde Park Gate.

We mention them as landmarks and nothing more; none has an arrangement with London Babes. Mansion flats and serviced apartments in SW7 are visited in the same way.

South Kensington station, on the Circle, District and Piccadilly lines, is about a minute from Harrington Road and the Institut. Gloucester Road, with the same three lines, is around 6 minutes west along Old Brompton Road, and Knightsbridge, on the Piccadilly line, is about 12 minutes east past the Oratory.

Choose a companion, then tell the desk your hotel or address, the start time and the number of hours. If a film is part of the plan, add the screening time, and she will meet you at the cinema door. Identity is confirmed once over WhatsApp, full name and room, and the desk replies with her name, the time and the fare in a single written line.

South Kensington is about an hour from confirmation on a typical night, more when the museums empty after a late opening. She receives her fare directly from you on arrival, and three hours of notice is enough to cancel a standard booking free of charge.

Seven, a French film at Ciné Lumière, the screen small enough to feel like a private showing. Nine, supper at a bistro on Old Brompton Road, steak frites and a carafe of something from the Loire. Half past ten, along Thurloe Place to the Oratory, its dome lit against the sky, and back through the quiet mews. Eleven, the hotel on Queen's Gate or a flat off Onslow Gardens.

The whole evening is a dinner date, £1,300 for four hours. Supper alone fits into two hours at £750, and an hour after the film begins at £400.

Visitors who stay near the Lycée because the quarter reminds them of Paris, and would like an evening that does too. Parents in town for a school event who finally have a night to themselves. Long stay guests in serviced flats off Cromwell Road who enjoy good cinema and better conversation. They tend to want a companion who reads subtitles without complaint, enjoys a long supper and is happy to talk about the film all the way home.

Danielle loves classic films and poetry, which makes Ciné Lumière her kind of evening. Milena is tall and direct, plays tennis and says exactly what she thought of the film on the way out. Thea, green eyed with caramel blonde hair, cycles everywhere and will happily swap the bistro for Japanese food if you ask.

Living in the quarter, they know its bistros and late screenings better than any guidebook. Everyone else on the girls page comes to SW7 on the same fares.

North across Cromwell Road lies Kensington, and the shops of Knightsbridge are a short walk east. South, the Fulham Road leads into Chelsea.