Ladies Who Lunch

B/W Chair Susan Diver * TV news reader Natarsha Belling * Mem Fox * Julia Baird * Dame Marie Bashir * Kate Carnell

 The Black and White Charity Committee raises funds for Vision Australia to provide support services for children and their families.  Each year they hold the Women Of Achievement lunch at the Four Season's Hotel at Circular Quay.
This is a great event: every penny raised goes to the charity as the ladies on the B/W Committee, cajole, beg, borrow and steal every aspect of the day. They are all unpaid volunteers and it's a pretty good achievement in itself to be able to draw over 500 attendees as they did this year, to pack the hotel ballroom.
Three distinguished ladies of "achievement" give a speech outlining their career and how they got there. Most started from humble beginnings This years speakers were Mem Fox who is married to the billionaire trucking magnate Lindsay Fox, ABC TV presenter Julia Baird and Kate Carnell former Chief Minister of the ACT and currently the Ombudsman for Small Business.
Among the guests, Gina Rinehart arguably the world's richest woman with a mining fortune and Dame Marie Bashir former NSW Governor, Professor Ross Steele, one of world's great experts on the French language and Olympian Jessica Gallagher.

Judith Crawley * Daniel Trelease * Maria Finlay * Professor Steele* Jessica Gallagher * Mike Levendi

Winners are grinners at the Diamond Awards

 Pictured above are jewelers Berj Ohanessian (centre) and Robert Musson (right) who received awards at the Diamond Guild Australia Awards at the Museum of Contemporary Art. Pictured left is Berjs ( Berjani Jewellery) creation Waves the overall winner for 2015. You pick up all 4ccts for $33,000. On the right is Robert's Loire creation which won him the Daily Diamonds award.
Diamonds are still very big business. Recently a flawless 100 carat gem sold for a whopping $22M at Southebys in New York.

Panos Levendi (left) and his brother Mike Levendi (right) of Levendi Jewellers won the Men's Award for their diamond ring Oceanus (inset)
(Diamond photos by David Perryman Photography)

Antoinette Marie wore the Perfect Summer Outfit when she joined pals Jennifer Hawkins & Jake Wall (below) for the launch of Sesion Tecquila

Above: Michael Wipfli & Guy Sebastion are Sesión Tequila fans

Is Tequila the new drink for this summer ? Oprah Winfrey seems to think so. She joined a bunch of pals last night-as our exclusive snap shows - to celebrate her Australian visit with Tecquila Sunrises.