Royal Wedding and weather lift French Connection sales

French Connection today hailed the Royal Wedding and sunny weather for a recent pick-up in sales in its UK stores.

Although like-for-like revenues were down 1.8% from February to the end of April, chief operating officer Neil Williams said that trading had improved during the Easter holidays as shoppers snapped up summer clothes, and the mood was lifted by the marriage of the Duke and Duchess of Cambridge.

Williams added that dresses were the chain's best-sellers in the period, helped by Pippa Middleton stepping out in two of the chain's designs.

Total sales rose 3.6% thanks to a strong performance from the company's wholesale arm, where deliveries were "well ahead" of last year.

However, its shares dropped 5¾p to 91p as the retailer admitted it was "cautious" about the health of the UK High Street for the rest of the year.