Pooch Wrestling at Banter

An interesting collection of guests turned out for the opening of the swish new French restaurant Banter in Surry Hills. Karim Ghabi of Casablanca nightclub fame hosted the evening while the delectable Laura Dundovic accompanied him greeting guests.

 One face we haven't seen out on the town lately, Fashion school supremo Leanne Whitehouse (left) who has been embroiled in a controversy over the Pm's daughter.  She sat quietly in a booth with designer Charlie Brown.
And we also got to meet Bentley, the largest feline in town who arrived in the arms of a friend of Christa Billich.
Bentley surveyed the scene with a rather haughty look and later wrestled a poor dog to the ground before going to sleep in a violinist's case which he was soon ejected from by a disgruntled musician.

From sampling some of Banter's delicacies on the night, this should be another fine addition to Sydney night life.


                         

Thorpedo Captured: London Olympics

Gold medalist Ian Thorpe has teamed up with Croatian born artist Charles Billich to produce a portrait for Thorpe's charity Fountain For Youth which raises funds for Indigenous kids. The painting, above will be auctioned.

Charles and his wife Christa threw a party at their Rock's studio and gallery to launch the painting. How do they manage to get these amazing premises?. The three tired gallery is one of the cities most desirable properties and was once the old Sailor's Home but now houses Billich works, some of which we present here.
 Below is his interpretation of The Last Supper ( a copy was presented to Cardinal Pell) which can be yours for $12,500. Not sure who the lady is in the picture in front-Mary Magdalene?.

And the London Olympics ?. Despite Thorpe just failing to qualify lucky Londoners will be treated to Charles' special Olympics print below which is for sale for a few thousand pounds and is being snapped up by British corporations and will be coming to a bank or insurance company wall near you soon.

Billich Gallery

blondes rule-Charlie Brown*Christa Billich*Shari Lee Hitchcock

Summer Fashion From Myer

As day follows night, the Myer fashion parade occurs a week after the David Jones parade.

To the Carriageworks in downtown Waterloo as Jennifer Hawkins and British import  Kris Smith ( Mr Danni Minogue ) launched the Myer Spring Summer 2011/2012 Collections last night with lots of  fresh, bright and bold colours

Brands new to Myer, Jayson Brunsdon, Fleur Wood and sass & bide (lured away from DJs with a multi-million dollar payout) plus new season collections by Myer’s leading stable of Australian designers and our favourite US import, Charlie Brown.

This summer campaign has drawn inspiration from the Australian landscape, with the show’s set design embracing the expansive and dramatic Pinnacles Desert in Western Australia. Models made their way down a 30-metre catwalk created to form a spectacular panoramic desert scene. 

Check out our exclusive back stage video below                                                              

Jennifer Hawkins

dapper Kris Smith

                                                             

Partying at Swifts, Babs & Frank Sinatra

To Swifts-the spledifourous folly of a mansion in Darling Point.

Nearby Wolesley Road in Point Point  may well be the  "9th most expensive street in the world"  but Swifts is the most valuable private home on the continent.

It was for sale about 10 years ago for $40M with no takers. It's valued at around $85M today, clipping home loan's boss John Symonds recently built Point Piper house that cost a whopping $70M.

 It comes with several acres of park lands and a  mansion that has it's own ballroom with a Juliet balcony. Swifts is owned by the Moran family who have a nursing home empire. Doug and Greta Moran paid a lazy $12M for the property in 1997 and spent another ten restoring the derelict house.

 Our spy disguised as a potted aspidistra tells us the house has been divided into 4 apartments with the feuding family members living in the different quarters. The Morans have had their family disputes but at least they have a nice pad and the kids haven't left home.

Swifts was built in 1841 by the Eton educated Sir Robert Tooth who made his fortune from brewing beer in the colonies. He wanted a bigger ballroom than the NSW Governor and he got one. Sir Robert eventually retired to London where King George V created the Tooth baronetcy in honour of the families charitable works. Tooth was also one of the first to give his employees paid holidays, sickness pay and a whole range of benefits. 

The wonderful hand-painted on glass adverts for Tooth's beer that adorned hundreds of pubs (above) were mostly destroyed during the 1970's-the few remaining ones are worth a fortune.

Edmund Resch,an Austrian born brewer purchased the property from Sir Robert but never quite enjoyed the social cache of the Tooths. Edmund was considered rough and common.  It eventually became the home of the Catholic Archbishop before falling into ruin and being rescued by the Morans.



singer Wes Carr & Charlotte Gregg

On Friday the Cornucopia Committee held their annual charity garden party at Swifts. These 'society' charities are often given a rough time in the media but they really do good works. Everything is donated- from services to food, alcohol (Pommery champagne) and the committee ladies work really hard raising hundreds of thousands of dollars every year to go towards child protection.

The wonderful opera singer Mark Vincent sang (as did Maria Venuti) racing identity Angela Belle McSweeney MC'd and Texan born designer Charlie Brown organised a fashion show. A rain shower failed to dampen spirits although the ballroom furniture supplanted around the garden was hastily brought inside.



a sun shower

Nor was there a faux pas like the one in 1994 when the Cornucopia's honorary international ambassador Barbara Sinatra was presented to an audience on a boat cruise.

Babs was in town with her husband Frank Sinatra when she agreed to speak on a summer day cruise around the harbour. She was well known for her charity work in the USA and Australia especially for raising funds to help abused and neglected kids.

As she sat at the head table on the boat the time came for Mrs Sinatra to give her speech. The MC, a rather dotty lady got up to announce her and after shushing the audience said :

"I would now like to introduce Mrs Barbara Sinatra. Barbara and Frank Sinatra have been heavily involved in child abuse all their lives "!!



Rupert Murdoch as you've never seen him before !

Here is one of the finalists in the Moran Art Prize for portraiture (the richest of it's kind in the world).

Looking  like something spooky out of the Portrait of Dorian Grey, it's artist Adam James K's interpretation of  Rupert Murdoch.

As the artist puts it- 

"my goal was to show a side of Mr Murdoch that we don't normally see-vulnerability mixed with a small dose of fear ".

He's right-we've never actually witnessed the vulnerable side of Mr Murdoch in all our sightings of the great media baron. Plenty have felt a good dose of fear from him though.

Nicky Hilton wears Charlie Brown

Mr James K says " Mr Murdoch gave me ten minutes to prepare some preliminary sketches and photos then said "very efficient Adam " before walking out the door.

A shiver runs up your spine just reading that.! You can see the rest of the Moran Prizes 2010 here.

 # You can also see fashion  entrepreneur Danny Avidan and designer Charlie Brown interviewed about the winning portrait. 

The pair hosted a  party for Nicky Hilton at Star City's Astral Bar tonight after she appeared earlier on the catwalk for Charlie's show  at the Rosemount Sydney Fashion Festival at the Town Hall..

Nicky's very nice but what does she do ?. We forgot to ask

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 Astronaut Buzz Aldrin will be in town soon on an assignment (secret at this stage).  He was on the first Moon mission in 1969 and the second to walk on the Moon (or a film set if you believe the conspiracy theories). We'll be lunching with Buzz and we're dying to ask him about the UFOs he said he saw on the Moon trip !