Husband and wife to take silk together

Husband and wife barrister duo Joanna Smith (pictured) and Mark Vanhegan will walk down the aisle together again when they both take silk before the Lord ­Chancellor next month.

Smith, of Wilberforce Chambers, and Vanhegan, of 11 South Square, who met at bar school in 1989 and were both called by Lincoln’s Inn in 1990, are among 104 new silks in the latest list of QC appointments.

Edward ;Nugee ;QC, ­former head of chambers at Wilberforce, said it was unusual for a husband and wife to take silk together, adding that in his 50 years at the bar he did not recall it ever happening before.

Despite this Smith and Vanhegan said their two daughters, aged seven and nine, “remain unimpressed” by their parents’ historic double.

Elsewhere on the list, 4 Pump Court construction specialist Sean Brannigan becomes a silk at the tender age of 37, while 39 Essex Street boasts the quickest silk appointment this year, with ;former ;solicitor Stephen Tromans making silk with just 10 years’ call.

The earliest call is David Marks of 3-4 South Square, who joined the bar in 1974.