Gatehouse Chambers - True Picture

Gatehouse Chambers pupillage review 2026

The Chambers

“The USP at this chambers is that it does have distinct specialisms, but they fit into each other rather nicely! So, our offering is different from any other chambers in terms of the spread,” says Gatehouse CEO Amanda Illing. For instance, a property practitioner might work on property damage under an insurance work banner, which comes out of the construction team. Commercial disputes is another key area for the chambers, which Illing describes as: “anumbrella that is a catch-all for all sorts of things, that could be financial and banking, it could be franchising, or it could be executive employment disputes work.”

“Property makes up quite a big part of chambers’ work and so it's also a lot of what we do at the junior end…”

But let’s zoom out a bit and look at the set’s practice areas more generally: “You've got a very strong property team, a very strong construction team, a good insolvency team, a very strong personal injury team,” boasted a former pupil. This is backed up by Gatehouse’s Chambers UK Bar rankings in areas like property damage, real estate litigation, construction, construction: professional negligence and costs litigation. “Property makes up quite a big part of chambers’ work and so it's also a lot of what we do at the junior end,” one pupil told us, “they definitely made a real effort to ensure that I got to see the areas that I wanted to see, and I'm really glad that I have seen such a range.”

If it’s headline-hitting cases you’re after, it’s hard to get more high-profile than the Vardy v Rooney case back in 2024. Gatehouse’s Robin Dunne acted for Coleen Rooney in a costs claim following Mrs. Rooney’s successful defence of a libel claim brought by Ms. Vardy. Elsewhere, in one recent construction insurance case, Paul Reed KC, Ebony Alleyne and James Shaw successfully represented Mace in the Court of Appeal over an insurer’s failure to pay out to cover the costs of water damage to Sky’s global headquarters in West London.

“An element of our work has always had an international flavour to it,” Illing tells us, “but a couple of years ago, we decided to ramp up our resources and inject something into our international programme.” As part of this drive, Gatehouse recruited Christian Wisskirchen, former international policy lead at the Bar Council, to “help us rocket launch our international programme” across practice areas.

The Pupillage Experience

Pupils have three supervisors for four months each. Work for the first supervisor is largely dead work: “It was partly because he was very senior and so a lot of the cases here that he was doing were maybe too high value or complex for me when I was in my first month,” one pupil explained. Of course, this means that supervisors can tailor the work to the level of the pupil: “He gave me tasks that were more a bit more suited to my level to allow me to hone and practice my written advocacy skills.” This kind of written advocacy is the focus of the first six, and that means drafting various documents including particulars, defences, replies, skeleton arguments, witness statements and “general legal research advice.” Other tasks include producing formal advice notes for clients.

Towards the end of the first six, there are two oral assessments designed to prepare pupils for being on their feet. As one pupil put it, “they wouldn't let you pass the assessments unless they felt like you were ready to be on your feet, so that was like a check coming up to the halfway point.” For this pupil, the first oral assessment was an interim application to set aside a default judgment, and the second a mock small claims trial.

Alongside an advocacy training programme, there are sessions on other things pupils might see in practice, including possession matters, bankruptcy, petitions and small claims trials.

“It’s definitely daunting, but I felt incredibly supported.”

“The biggest change in second six was being on our feet and that was a really steep learning curve,” shared a current pupil. What does this look like on a week-to-week basis? “I've been in court, and led in the County Court, maybe one or two times a week since May.” Pupils might also get in court on possession hearings and access injunctions and produce written advice and pleadings. “It’s definitely daunting, but I felt incredibly supported,” a pupil reassured us, since there’s always a junior nearby who they can seek out for advice. This pupil also described how their supervisor talked through the papers with them before they went to court with their first few cases, “so they do hold your hand a bit at the beginning of second six.”

Pupils have five “wingers,” who are other members of chambers for whom they complete three pieces of work each before the tenancy decision. They might also accompany their wingers to mediations or similar events. Pupils are encouraged to do work outside of this, but their wingers will be their main sources of work besides their supervisors.

Before pupillage starts, incoming pupils have a discussion with the pupillage coordinator about which areas of the law they’re interested in trying. This feeds into the allocation of supervisors and wingers. “The wingers are either a good way for you to do more of the stuff you're interested in, or it's a way of exploring other areas of law that otherwise you wouldn't get the opportunity to look at,” explained a former pupil.

Pupils receive feedback on each of the pieces of work they complete. For one former pupil this helped ease the nerves a little: “although obviously until you get the tenancy decision, you don't know the way it's going to go, I felt comfortable with the way it was going to go based on that feedback.” Feedback comes in a table which lays out whether a pupil met the standard to be a junior tenant across several metrics. There’s also a formal feedback session with each supervisor near the end of each seat.

In short, as long as pupils show a willingness and ability to act on feedback, mistakes aren’t the end of the world: “We know you're going to make mistakes. We still make mistakes. It's how you learn from them, It's the trajectory,” emphasises McCann.

The tenancy decision is based on the reports from supervisors and wingers, and the formal assessments. The pupillage committee reviews the reports of pupils’ performance from the supervisors, wingers and anyone else the pupils have worked for throughout the year and writes a report summarising this information. This is then passed on to the management committee for review along with the committee’s recommendation. Pupils are then informed of the decision. “You're not in competition in the sense that if you're both good enough, you both get taken on, even if you're both working in the same practice area,” McCann reassures us.

The standard working hours of 9am to 6pm are “roughly representative of the hours I have worked,” shared one pupil. There can sometimes be slightly longer hours or work at the weekend in the run up to deadlines, “but that has certainly been the exception rather than the rule” and tenants will tell pupils to go home if they see them working past 6pm.

“It is very friendly and supportive,” one pupil told us of the set, “and prides itself on being very progressive.” We hear something similar from Sarah McCann, head of the pupillage committee: “What I think is cohesive about us is that we're a very open set, a very friendly set,” she emphasises, “we are all about recognising the pros of diversity and inclusion and equality.” For example, barristers are free to get involved in the EDI task forces which include social mobility and race and religion.

The Application Process

Gatehouse takes on two pupils per year. Initial applications are through Pupillage Gateway. At this stage, Gatehouse has questions that are “all designed to check specific competencies, because we really don't care where you come from,” says McCann, “all we're interested in is merit.” These competencies include analytical and advocacy skills.

“…we really don't care where you come from, all we're interested in is merit.”

Next, there are two rounds of interviews; approximately 40 candidates are invited to the first round and about 13 to the second round. Questions vary year on year, but generally interviews will feature a mock argument of some kind, such as a mock injunction application, a mock submission or arguing for a particular position which might not even be related to law. Bear in mind that: “we're not really testing your legal ability as much as the other core skills around how you think,” McCann explains. There are also more personal questions where candidates can showcase their skills and talk about their abilities.

For successful applicants, most members share rooms. As a result: “There's rarely been a day during pupillage where I've come in and I've just been sat in a room on my own or with my supervisor and I haven't seen anyone else all day,” one told us. “People are constantly popping into each other's rooms, not even to ask for advice, sometimes just for a chat, which is really, really nice, and it makes it much nicer to come in.”

so,pils are encouraged to regularly visit the practice team to build relationships: “One member of the practice team also took on a sort of pastoral role during the year and she would check in with us and so it was quite nice to go into second sixth already having those very important relationships in place,” a pupil told us.

As a more modern set, “there are no traditions that have to be met or that are kept to or anything like that because we're far more forward thinking,” says McCann. That said, there are plenty of organised social events, from external networking events hosting solicitors or seminars. According to a pupil, “there's a regular group that goes out for lunch together on Fridays and invites everyone who's in chambers to go along with them.”