After hosting annual evening events, the Santa Barbara branch of the American Cancer Society threw a lunch this year in the Hilton’s Reagan Room for nearly 100 guests, which raised around $100,000 for the popular organization, which helps more than 100,000 people in the western region annually. Chairwoman Denise Sanford emceed the fete which honored […]
It seemed appropriate that this year’s tenth annual sell-out Green Gala thrown by the 49-year-old Community Environmental Council, raising around $300,000 for the cause, coincided with Global Climate Week. The boffo bash at Sherry Villanueva‘s Funk Zone eatery, The Lark, lavishly decorated in green hues, was co-chaired by Elizabeth Wagner, Carolyn Fitzgerald, and Leanne Schlinger, […]
It was horsepower of a very different kind on display at the Santa Barbara Polo Club when the 8th annual Montecito Motor Classic, which used to display its pricey wares on Coast Village Road, pitched up at the Carpinteria equestrian facility. With the theme Supercar Designs & Legacy Milestones, featuring one-of-a-kind cars made by Lamborghini, […]
ShelterBox, the Santa Barbara-based charity, has had its hands full of late with a whole slew of global disasters, most recently in the Bahamas from Hurricane Dorian. More than 250 guests turned out at the Summerland estate of John McGovern for a sunset fundraiser, which garnered around $250,000 for the 19-year-old nonprofit, which has responded […]
Santa Barbara twosome Ivan and Polly Pelly are enjoying the sweet life! The dynamic duo has just launched Ivan Bar, a new nutritional candy with Macadamia nuts, almonds, chia, hemp and pumpkin seeds, and dates. “I bought my last grocery store snack bar four years ago,” says Ivan, a software engineer from the U.K. “They […]
Hospice of Santa Barbara hosted its 7th annual Jewels by the Sea lunch at the Coral Casino when more than 340 guests helped raise a record $165,000 for the nonprofit. The sun suffused bash, co-chaired by Robin Himovitz, Melinda Goodman-Kemp, and Jill Kitnick, was emceed by KEYT-TV husband and wife anchors CJ Ward and Beth […]
Heal the Ocean founder Hillary Hauser celebrated her 75th birthday in style at the Person Ryan Gallery at the Summerland Center for the Arts. Hillary, who is marking the occasion by flying to Normandy, which is celebrating the 75th anniversary of the D-Day landings, also exhibited a number of her colorful fish paintings, with all […]
Santa Barbara’s New House, a 64-year-old nonprofit to help men suffering from alcohol and drug dependency, held its fourth annual lunch with a sold-out record 270 guests at the Hilton emceed by KEYT-TV reporter John Palminteri, which raised around $35,000. The charity’s three residences in our Eden by the Beach provide 98 beds for those […]
It was up, up and stay at Elings Park when it hosted its first hot air balloon and wine festival featuring tethered balloons hovering 75ft. above the ground. For a nominal fee 500 guests were offered the chance to rise to new heights in the four colorful balloons that were anchored to the turf. “It’s […]
Veteran Montecito comedienne Carol Burnett, 86, was front and center at the fifth annual Legends gala on the stage of the venerable Granada Theatre. Carol, whose eponymous award-winning show ran on CBS from 1967 to 1978, was introduced by her good friend, fellow Montecito author and film writer Fannie Flagg, as video showed some of […]
After my exclusive about KEYT-TV chief meteorologist Alan Rose departing for Colorado after 14 years on TV Hill, I now hear he is being replaced by Kelsey Gerckens, a regular on the ABC affiliate’s morning show with her husband, co-anchor Joe Buttitta, according to news director Jim Lemon. The tony twosome obviously work well together […]
A record 190 guests turned out at the Biltmore for the 73-year-old Mental Wellness Center’s 9th annual Merryl Brown-designed lunch, which was expected to raise $175,000 for general funds to help families, adults, and teens. The keynote speaker was Sonali Beaven, an author and mental health advocate, who lost her father, Todd, on United Boeing […]
The La Pacifica Ballroom at the Coral Casino was socially gridlocked when the Santa Barbara Foundation honored its 76th Man and Woman of the Year in front of 280 guests. Between them, Montecito philanthropist Jelinda DeVorzon and David Boyd, a member of All Saints-by-the-Sea Episcopal Church, have a combined half century of service to the […]
Santa Barbara Museum of Art is accentuating the negative with its latest exhibition Salt & Silver. The show, featuring more than 100 seldom-displayed salt prints from the Wilson Centre for Photography in London, provides a rare chance to experience some of the earliest photographs ever made by many of the most important and groundbreaking figures […]
The rotunda at the Hilton was jammed when the 38th Taste of the Town threw its 10th annual Connoisseurs’ Circle gala, co-chaired by Lori Farnsworth and John O’Neill, for 213 foodies and wine lovers 48 hours before its popular Riviera epicurean festival with a tidal wave of restaurateurs, caterers, winemakers, and breweries serving samples of […]
It was a double occasion for celebration when Montecito animal rights activist Gretchen Lieff threw a sunset soirée at Tydes at the Coral Casino when her longtime beau medical equipment executive Miles Hartfeld celebrated his 66th birthday. The peripatetic twosome just returned from sojourns in Oahu and Kauai where they got engaged, Gretchen tells me. […]
A tidal wave of generosity swept over the 147-year-old Santa Barbara Yacht Club for the 15th annual Yachts of Love regatta, which was expected to raise more than $120,000 for the 111-year-old Visiting Nurse & Hospice Care from the more than 400 guests. The nautical jolly, which since its inception has raised more than $1.4 […]
Dynamic duo Ray Winn and Peter Kavoian certainly know how to throw a party! As the tony twosome, who normally host a must-attend Christmas bash at their opulent Birnam Wood manse, will be away this Yuletide, they threw a Hillbilly Hoedown bash, designed by Jonathan Alburger, complete with hay bales, Victorian underwear hanging from the […]
Santa Barbara has just added a new art gallery to its myriad collection with the opening of Chessmar Sculpture Studios on East Anapamu Street by Brian Anders Chessmar, a graduate of The School of Art Institute of Chicago. “My work is an exploration – emotional, physical, and spiritual – of what is seen and unseen […]
With more than $1 billion in sales last year, with an average sale price of $1,440,000, uber realtor Renee Grubb had good reason to celebrate when she hosted a sunset soirée at the historic Santa Barbara Club. More than 150 guests turned out on the impeccably manicured lawns for the Village Properties appreciation party, including […]
It was the perfect time to meet new executive director Pilar Montoya when 20-year-old AHA!, a successful teen program which serves 5,000 families annually in California, hosted a beach bash at the Padaro Lane home of Frank and Tiffany Foster. Pilar brings 25 years of business and financial management to the table working with companies […]
A torrent of tony tête toppers filled the Biltmore’s Loggia Ballroom when Montecito uber philanthropist Leslie Ridley-Tree, dressed immaculately in pink with magnificent millinery from Fenwicks of London, celebrated the 45th anniversary of her half century. The boffo bash was hosted by the Lady of Largesse’s many friends including Hiroko Benko, Bob and Val Montgomery, […]
After more than 17 years in Santa Barbara, including 14 years as weathercaster at the ABC affiliate, KEYT-TV, Alan Rose is swapping TV Hill for the ski slopes of the Rockies, I can exclusively reveal. Alan is joining the weather team at KOAA-TV, a Scripps-owned NBC affiliate in Colorado Springs. “The move is all too […]
It was the battle of the bridled behemoths at the Santa Barbara Polo Club when former president Dan Walker‘s Farmers & Merchants Bank team took on current president Texan tycoon John Muse‘s Lucchese team for the 110-year-old Silver Air Pacific Coast Open trophy, the most prestigious tournament on the Left Coast. With a record 4,000 […]
Former President George W. Bush, 73, who was resident at the White House from 2001 to 2009, will be in Montecito on December 17 to mark the celebration of the 60th anniversary of the Turner Foundation at the Rosewood Miramar, which, with more than 400 guests, is expected to raise more than $500,000 for the […]
I got a decidedly chilli reception when I attended a fundraiser for the Santa Barbara Navy League at the Carriage and Western Art Museum. But that was only to be expected given I was asked to be a judge along with Bill Pintard, manager of the Santa Barbara Foresters baseball team, and insurance executive Peter […]
To La Cocina, formerly Somerset, with my snapperazzi Priscilla, to check out the made-over East Anapamu Street eatery, which now features Mexican-Californian cuisine. The charming back courtyard, filled with lavender bushes and gnarled ancient fig trees brought in by flatbed trucks from Northern California and craned in over the rooftops when it first opened after […]
The Marjorie Luke Theatre at Santa Barbara Junior High was packed to the eaves when Montecito rocker Kenny Loggins, in collaboration with Janet Adderley’s Advanced Conservatory, celebrated the music of Footloose on its 35th anniversary. Kenny, who also showed some fancy footwork, composed theme music that would become the 1984 film and, later, a Broadway […]
Memories reigned supreme when Santa Barbara Zoo held its 34th annual Zoofari gala with a Summer Camp theme, billed as “more fun than jumping off a dock and more exciting than flashlight tag.” More than 600 guests, dressed in camp counselor T-shirts, cargo shorts, lifeguard outfits, safari attire, flip flops, and hiking boots, converged on […]
To the Bluewater Grill with my snapperazzi Priscilla where, on the second Tuesday of each month, the popular eatery offers a new seafood tasting menu. The all-inclusive dinner included chipotle blackened swordfish with rice, corn and avocado relish with clam chowder – Manhattan or New England – and a glass of Cuvee Rouge. Scrumptious… Moving […]
Globetrotting journalist Kimi Matar, who used to write the Honolulu Social Diary, but now spends much of her time in our Eden by the Beach, did double duty at the Rosewood Miramar’s charming Manor bar when she combined her birthday celebration with Epicurean Santa Barbara’s Wine Down Wednesday. Oenophiles and gourmands were out in force […]
Social gridlock reigned in the courtyard at the Lobero Theatre when the two-year-old Santa Barbara Council of Charitable Gift Planners, which helps increase community philanthropy through charitable gift giving, hosted its annual reception. Chapter president and Noozhawk columnist Rochelle Rose welcomed more than 50 guests, including Greg Gorga, Ellen Goodstein, Anais Pellegrini, Charles Caldwell, Karl […]
Montecito author Mark Brickley, who wrote the music biography Postcards From Liverpool: Beatles Moments & Memories two years ago, has re-issued the book of Fab Four vignettes with five new chapters and two dozen new photos of the mop-topped rockers. The book’s new edition includes a chapter on how to collect, grade and value classic […]
Peripatetic Summerland twosome Marv and Gray Bauer are looking forward to the Tokyo Olympics next year with special interest. Their granddaughter Miki Dahlke, a senior at Harvard, has just qualified for the Olympic trials in the 200-meter freestyle at the Phillips 66 National Championships at Stanford University. Hailing from Mill Valley, where she attended Tamalpais […]
Statuesque culinary goddess Julia Child, who died two days short of her 92nd birthday in 2004, would have been 107 years of age last week, and many admirers of the first celebrity chef were determined she not be forgotten. Mayor Cathy Murillo joined nearly 200 guests at Beanie Baby billionaire Ty Warner‘s beautiful Morocco-inspired Montecito […]
On a personal note, I remember Geoffrey Rutkowski, former principal cellist of the Santa Barbara Symphony, who has died aged 78. A charming, gentle and enormously talented individual, Geoffrey joined the music faculty at UCSB in 1968 until his retirement in 2013 as a Distinguished Professor Emeritus. He played all over the world, including two […]
Montecito actress Julia Louis-Dreyfus‘ critically acclaimed HBO series Veep went on hiatus while she underwent treatment for breast cancer. Now Julia, 58, has opened up to the celebrity glossy, Vanity Fair, about her cancer diagnosis and returning to work after a life-threatening illness. On the cover of the Conde Nast monthly Julia wears a diaphanous […]
An interesting new flag is “flying” at the Santa Barbara Polo Club. The flag, the concept of firefighter-artist John Carrillo, who made the first version for the retirement for Santa Barbara fire chief Pat McElroy, incorporates hoses used by the Montecito Fire Department to fight the 2017 Thomas Fire. Throughout the disaster, the SB Polo […]
The Music Academy of the West concluded its 72nd annual summer festival on a high note when the Academy Festival Orchestra, under conductor Marin Alsop, performed Dvorak’s Symphony No. 7 at the Granada. The entertaining program also comprised of Pulitzer Prize-winning composer Jennifer Higdon‘s 13-minute piece blue cathedral, just a week after her well received […]
Santa Barbara equestrian Karen Jenkins, 80, is presenting her quarter horse Homer, 20, in a Century Club Ride, sponsored by the U.S. Dressage Foundation, at the Earl Warren Showgrounds next Saturday (17). The rare event is designed for horse and rider who achieve the combined age of 100. Karen, her husband, Si, and son, Josiah, own […]