Pupillage

Portrait of Elspeth Talbot Rice KC

XXIV Old Buildings has, for over 50 years, enjoyed a reputation of excellence for chancery and commercial work at the English Bar. We are a friendly and forward-thinking set, with a commitment to recruiting and training pupils who – regardless of background – have the potential to become the best advocates of the future.

We are advertising for up to 2 pupils to begin pupillage in October 2024 and 3 pupils to begin in October 2025, in each case with an award of £85,000. This is one of the most generous awards at the Bar, and it reflects our desire to recruit the very best applicants to be pupils with us.

Members of chambers work at the cutting-edge of the areas in which we practice, and chambers has a long tradition of acting in the leading, precedent-setting, chancery and commercial cases: from Schmidt v Rosewood to Choitram v Pagarani, and from Wood v Capita to Times Travel (UK) Ltd v Pakistan International Airline Corporation.

Chambers is distinguished by combining its excellence in the English courts with an unrivalled reputation for international and cross-border litigation. As well as appearing in courts and tribunals at every level in England and Wales, members of chambers frequently appear as advocates, offer advice, act as arbitrators and work alongside other lawyers in jurisdictions around the world, including the British Virgin Islands, the Cayman Islands, Jersey, Guernsey, the Isle of Man, the United Arab Emirates, The Bahamas, Bermuda, Gibraltar, China, Hong Kong, Switzerland, and Singapore. You can read more about us and our work on the profile compiled by Chambers Student.

Our pupils are the future of chambers. We pride ourselves on our fair and rigorous application process. We focus determinedly on our pupils’ training, and do not see pupillage as a long series of competitive assessments. We want all of our pupils to go on to become tenants with us: in the last two years we have taken on 100% of our pupils as tenants. We think that we can offer you one of the most enjoyable, well-structured and generously funded pupillages at the Bar – and we hope those of you successful in applying will agree.

Elspeth Talbot Rice KC
HEAD OF CHAMBERS