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Contact

Contact with chambers should be made through the Practice Management Team. They are happy to discuss client requirements and provide further information on such matters as the expertise and experience of individual members, fees, working practices and languages spoken. We have members able to work in French, German, Italian, Spanish, Dutch, Swedish, Greek and Chinese (Mandarin).

Outside working hours, a member of our team is always available to be contacted on matters of an urgent nature. Contact should be made using the Chambers main number or email.

For our Singapore office, for client enquiries please contact our Head of Business Development for Asia Pacific, Katie-Beth Jones, and for all other queries please contact Lynn Quek. Out of office hours calls will automatically be diverted to our practice management team in London.

London

20 Essex Street
London
WC2R 3AL

enquiries@twentyessex.com
t: +44 20 7842 1200

Singapore

28 Maxwell Road
#02-03 Maxwell Chambers Suites
Singapore 069120

singapore@twentyessex.com
t: +65 62257230

Contact

Contact with chambers should be made through the Practice Management Team. They are happy to discuss client requirements and provide further information on such matters as the expertise and experience of individual members, fees, working practices and languages spoken. We have members able to work in French, German, Italian, Spanish, Dutch, Swedish, Greek and Chinese (Mandarin).

Outside working hours, a member of our team is always available to be contacted on matters of an urgent nature. Contact should be made using the Chambers main number or email.

For our Singapore office, for client enquiries please contact our Head of Business Development for Asia Pacific, Katie-Beth Jones, and for all other queries please contact Lynn Quek. Out of office hours calls will automatically be diverted to our practice management team in London.

London

20 Essex Street
London
WC2R 3AL

enquiries@twentyessex.com
t: +44 20 7842 1200

Singapore

28 Maxwell Road
#02-03 Maxwell Chambers Suites
Singapore 069120

singapore@twentyessex.com
t: +65 62257230

David Lewis KC

David Lewis KC

Silk: 2014 Call: 1999 (England and Wales); 2017 (British Virgin Islands)

Languages: French (proficient)

David is a specialist advocate who took silk in 2014 at the age of 36. He has been described as a “meticulous and formidable silk who can cut through complex cases”.

He is experienced in a wide range of general commercial and private international law disputes, with an emphasis on energy and natural resources (including renewables), shipping and commodities, civil fraud and the conflict of laws. He also has a particular interest in crypto disputes.

David is renowned for his strategic instincts as to how judges and arbitrators think, his incisive intellect and his responsiveness. He is frequently involved in complex, high value, multi-jurisdictional disputes either leading a large team or working as co-counsel with foreign lawyers. He also has considerable experience of injunctive relief, in particular anti-suit and freezing injunctions.

A substantial amount of his work is in international arbitration. David has acted as lead counsel in arbitration hearings in London, Singapore (where he was based permanently from 2009 to 2010), Paris, Dubai and Hong Kong. He is regularly instructed on challenges to arbitration awards and disputes relating to their enforcement. He was nominated for ‘International Arbitration Silk of the Year 2019’ by The Legal 500.

In addition to appearances at all levels of the High Court (including the appellate courts), he is called to the Bar of the British Virgin Islands (BVI), registered to appear in the Singapore International Commercial Court (as a foreign lawyer) and in the DIFC Courts and has appeared (ad hoc) before the Courts of the Cayman Islands and Gibraltar.

He is a Fellow of the Chartered Institute of Arbitrators, accepts appointments as arbitrator, and has acted as arbitrator under various institutional rules and ad hoc. He also gives expert evidence on English law in foreign Court proceedings.

 

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Example cases

Arbitration

Banking and financial services

Civil fraud and asset tracing

Energy and infrastructure

Jurisdiction, conflicts & enforcement

Shipping

Sectors and services

Publications

Professional memberships

Lectures/talks

Education

Very highly regarded by solicitors, David is encyclopaedically brilliant, authoritative and yet polite, and meticulously prepared.

The Legal 500 UK Bar 2024

David is incredibly thorough and meticulously prepared for every conference and every hearing. He has deep expertise in international trade matters. A team player who interacts wonderfully with lay and professional clients.

The Legal 500 UK Bar 2024

David is incredibly bright, calm and collected on his feet, with razor-sharp attention to detail.

The Legal 500 UK Bar 2024

David has an outstanding intellect and is always available, courteous and excellent with clients.

The Legal 500 UK Bar 2024

David Lewis is someone you take very seriously if you see him on the other side.

Chambers UK Bar 2024

He's one of the best examples of the modern legal brain. He's super responsive, provides just the right level of analysis, and is crisp and clear.

Chambers UK Bar 2024

David makes himself familiar with the case and available for all work that needs to be done. A barrister who never sacrifices quality, he is fantastic at providing advice in a clear and succinct manner, even when the issues in the case are complicated.

Chambers UK Bar 2024

David Lewis does exceptionally well in technically challenging cases.

Chambers UK Bar 2024

A go-to counsel for the most complex disputes, he is sharp and commercially minded, approachable and accommodating to the needs of even of the most demanding clients.

Chambers UK Bar 2024

Massively able and unflappable. Very measured advocacy.

The Legal 500 UK Bar 2024

Brilliant at structuring arguments in a methodical way.

Chambers UK Bar 2024

He's extremely diligent and gets completely immersed in the detail.

Chambers UK Bar 2024

He is an exceptionally user-friendly KC who is very responsive, and he cares about the outcome.

Chambers UK Bar 2024

David is very good, very bright, easy to work with and a go-to for a lot of work in this space.

Chambers UK Bar 2024

He is very clear in his advice and has the ability to take something very complex and break it down to make it understandable.

Chambers UK Bar 2024

David Lewis is very user-friendly, solid and technically smart.

Chambers Asia-Pacific 2024

His preparation is second to none and it inspires a lot of confidence in the client.

Chambers Asia-Pacific 2024

David is an excellent silk with impressive advocacy skills. Someone to go to for sophisticated advice on complex points

Chambers UK Bar 2023

Simply fantastic – superb on jurisdiction.

The Legal UK Bar 2023

Extremely clever and efficient, he is not phased by large amounts of material

The Legal UK Bar 2023

He has the intellectual skill, he's a very good advocate and a penetrating cross-examiner.

Chambers UK Bar 2023

An accessible and very user-friendly silk who rolls up his sleeves and fights the client’s corner from the outset, he is superbly well-prepared, robust and persuasive.

The Legal UK Bar 2023

David is user-friendly, incredibly intelligent and willing to take on board commercial concerns and arguments.

Chambers UK Bar 2023

Superbly well-prepared and assiduous, he does not miss a point and identifies ones that nobody else has thought of.

The Legal UK Bar 2023

Great on his feet, strong and persuasive but with an easy manner that appeals to tribunals.

The Legal UK Bar 2023

David is able to dissect complicated issues and advise in a clear and concise manner. He is equally effective at communicating with tribunal judges as well.

The Legal 500 Asia Pacific 2023: The English Bar

Strategically pitch-perfect. He is very good with clients and a very good advocate.

Chambers UK Bar 2022

He is unperturbable on his feet and a go-to barrister for all shipping and commodities disputes.

The Legal 500 Asia Pacific 2022: The English Bar

He is extremely user-friendly and will roll his sleeves up and get stuck into a case - you really feel like he is truly part of your team when you work with him. He is also able to deal with vast number of documents and get to grips with issues very quickly.

Chambers UK Bar 2022

Extremely bright and he has very strong analytical skills. He is unerringly pleasant to work with, always willing to muck-in and be part of a legal team. His advocacy is first-rate.

The Legal UK Bar 2022

He is a meticulous and formidable silk who can cut through complex cases.

Chambers UK Bar 2022

He knows the area inside out, is extremely user-friendly and brings with him strategic brilliance and a formidable intellect.

The Legal UK Bar 2022

As well as being very bright, he is a fantastic team player and a go-to silk for top energy clients.

The Legal UK Bar 2022

It is always a pleasure to work with David. He is extraordinarily bright, has an extensive knowledge of shipping law and wider commercial law, and is someone you want in your team on big cases.

The Legal UK Bar 2022

Absolutely superb. He thinks about things in a careful way and presents them in a very attractive and succinct manner.

Chambers UK Bar 2021

extremely intelligent, fantastic oral and written advocate who conveys complex points succinctly and clearly

Chambers UK Bar 2021

A very deft and clever advocate in complex, multi-jurisdictional disputes.

The Legal 500 UK Bar 2021

An excellent silk - he is hugely intelligent and can read into complex matters and produce top quality notes of advice, pleadings and other documents with incredible speed.

The Legal 500 UK Bar 2021

He is an excellent advocate, hardworking and destined for the top.

The Legal 500 UK Bar 2020

He is not destabilised by aggressive opposite numbers or by questionable tactics. 

The Legal 500 Asia Pacific 2020: The English Bar

Efficient, very intelligent, quick at turning things around, very pleasant and good to deal with. His written work is clear, succinct and effective.

Chambers UK Bar 2020

A leader in his field who is destined for the top; he has an encyclopaedic knowledge of case law and exceptional advocacy skills.

The Legal 500 UK Bar 2020

His attention to detail is astonishing and his written submissions in particular are some of the best I have ever seen at his level.

Chambers UK Bar 2020

He has a down-to-earth approach to advocacy and is very respectful to all concerned, but still lands the body blows.

Chambers UK Bar 2020

He engages with everything, pays good attention to detail and will fight for his clients.

Chambers UK Bar 2020

He's a very good, very elegant advocate.

Chambers UK Bar 2020

Very effective and incisive. He is hard-working, intellectually gifted and a pleasure to work with.

Chambers UK Bar 2019

A lethal advocate with copious amounts of charm and the ability to disarm the most hostile judges.

Chambers UK 2018

An excellent advocate. He's able to cut through all the things that aren't relevant to find the right solution. He's approachable, practical and efficient.

Chambers UK Bar 2018

Measured and magisterial, he is very bright, responsive and committed; he should go very far.

The Legal 500 UK Bar 2018

He is simply exceptional.

The Legal 500 UK Bar 2018

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