“Food and wine are just the best things in the world, aren’t they?” the British designer Molly Goddard says with a laugh. Dressed in a matching cardigan and skirt in a kaleidoscopic poppy print, she’s surveying the party she’s throwing at the newly opened Russell Square restaurant Neptune during London Fashion Week. A D.J. is spinning dance hall tracks at a bar festooned with strings of multicolored balloons and draped with rose-pink metallic fringe. At intimate tables of two or four, hungry guests tuck into what Goddard calls “speed” dinners, in which three courses are served within a 40-minute sitting, to allow guests to either stay on and party or head home for an early night. The rest of the 200-strong crowd — a mix of friends, fashion editors, loyal fans of Goddard’s eponymous brand and models fresh from her recent runway show — are dancing to Sean Paul’s “Get Busy.” “We’ve got buckets of beer, wine, prosecco, cocktails. Whatever anyone wants, we have it,” the designer adds with a smile.

While Goddard is used to hosting low-key dinners for close friends at her home in East London, this party, held last Saturday night, is the first big event the 29-year-old designer has hosted since launching her namesake line in 2012; Goddard wanted to showcase her brand’s playful spirit on a larger scale than her usual post-show trip to the pub with her team. Earlier in the day, Goddard had presented her spring 2019 collection in Covent Garden, where models walked down the runway in frothy polka-dot party frocks and psychedelic flower-print cardigans, carrying oversize cabbages against their hips. Food and drink are as much a constant on Goddard’s runways as her signature voluminous tulle dresses, and often used as props or as part of set pieces: During her spring 2016 show, models stood at steel work tables with loafs of white bread and jars of jelly, making sandwiches; her fall 2017 show at the Tate Modern took inspiration from a drunken dinner party, complete with bottles upon bottles of red wine. “I like to see my clothes in the habitat that they’d be worn in,” explains Goddard.

Image A homemade bouquet of fresh roses and foliage sits atop the cocktail bar in a punch bowl. Credit... Ophelia Wynne

At this most recent celebration, many of the guests — including the model Edie Campbell — are wearing favorite Goddard pieces from past seasons. Goddard’s fanciful gowns, often constructed from hundreds of meters of ruched and ruffled tulle or cotton, are designed for twirling around a dance floor. In the restaurant’s main dining area — tables and chairs now cleared away to make space — partygoers move in flounces of turquoise, shocking pink and blush. That most of Goddard’s pieces can be thrown in the washing machine after a night of festivities also plays into her lively and fuss-free approach to entertaining. Here, she shares her recipe for an elegant but fun-filled evening.