Influential Trio
A tony triumvirate – Montecito Bank & Trust chairman Janet Garufis, former chairman of Raytheon Dan Burnham, and Sarah Chrisman, a co-founder of a Silicon Valley telecommunications company – has joined the board of the Santa Barbara Symphony.
“Their experience and commitment to the arts in Santa Barbara is unparalleled,” says executive director Kevin Marvin. “They will be essential in guiding our vision for the future.”
The 66-year-old organization is clearly in good hands.
Celebrating the Chateau
The storied Chateau Marmont, where I used to bunk before moving to Hancock Park in Los Angeles permanently in 2001 after nearly 25 years in Manhattan, is celebrating its 90th birthday.
The Sunset Boulevard institution, built by attorney and developer Fred Horowitz and now owned by an old New York friend Andre Balazs since 1990, is now the subject of an HBO mini-series and a new book The Castle on Sunset: Life, Death, Love, Art, and Scandal by Shawn Levy, being published by Doubleday in May.
I used to stay in penthouse 64, a favorite of magnate and moviemaker Howard Hughes, with its sweeping views of the Sunset Strip and the hotel’s pool, locale to the cottage where comedian John Belushi, aged just 33, died in 1982 of a lethal drug cocktail.
Soon after I moved to the Big Orange from the Big Apple, affable hostelry manager Philip Truelove took the reverse journey becoming manager of the equally trendy Mercer Hotel in SoHo, also owned by Balazs.
Truelove, who started his career at London’s Ritz Hotel in 1970, is now manager of the 88-room Greenwich Hotel, a former Tribeca warehouse transformed by actor Robert De Niro.
Fond memories…
Talking our Tony Town for Ten Years
This issue marks the tenth anniversary of Miscellany in this illustrious organ.
More than 500 columns, some 1.5 million words, judicious wordsmithing, an avalanche alliteration, and a plethora of punnery.
On to the next decade…
Sightings: Miramar developer Rick Caruso noshing with friends at the Honor Bar… Singer Pink at the Goodland Hotel’s Outpost restaurant… Actor Christopher Lloyd checking out Pierre Lafond
Pip! Pip!
