4.3.08: Sunny brisk Spring day in New York

Sunny brisk Spring day in New York

Looking south from Grand Street between 6th Avenue and Thompson. 8:30 PM. Photo: JH.

Sunny brisk Spring day in New York. The buds are juuuuhhhh .... sst about to bud. On the corner of 79th Street and East End Avenue where the crosstown bus starts, the row of pears burst in bloom in the afternoon’s sun.

If it’s Wednesday, it must be Michael’s boldface. The lunch-junkie’s madhouse. Just kidding. But the place was jumping with McCarty and Millington meeting and greeting; energy bursting like the trees in the Park. Mercedes Bass was lunching with Diana Taylor. Another Taylor, Chris was lunching with Richard Johnson of Page Six and Matt Frankel. Deborah Norville in the bay with Diane Clehane who documents the Wednesday Michael’s for mediabistro.com. Miki Ateyeh lunching with Deborah Voight of the Metropolitan Opera. Broadway’s Gerry Schoenfeld with former political pundit Michael Kramer who has written a play.


	Renee Zellweger

And across the way some of Kramer’s midweek lunch buddies including Jerry della Femina and Dr. Gerry Imber. Steven Stolman with Frank Rico; Men’s Health’s Dave Zinczenko with Best Life’s Steve Perrine; Los Angeles’ international photographer Tim Street-Porter; Terry Allen Kramer with her son-in-law (‘my best friend…”) and granddaughter; and at another table, cousin Herb Allen III. Historian Doris Kearns Goodwin with her historical speech-writer husband Richard Goodwin; art collector Katherine Farley; Reese Schonfeld with Donna Hanover; Time magazine’s John Huey; Author Sarah Medford; Hearst veep Deb Shriver Steve Rubenstein with John Sykes; and a cast of hundreds including Jolie Hunt, Frank Gifford, Peggy Siegal, Chris Meigher, Larry Kaiser, Joe Versace, Beverly Camhe, Gerry Byrne, Judy Price.

And the movie star: Renee Zellweger. We engaged Miss Zellweger in conversation as she passed and happened to stop by our table. She lives mainly in New York now, she told us (you probably know that already). She admired my lunch date, Nancy North’s dress (by Nina McLemore). She told me she was from Austin, Texas (I asked; you probably already knew that too). She’s kinda tall for a movie star and reed-slender (but not too), long and lithesome with many women in the room wishing they could look like that; in highest heels and a grey sheath and wide black cinch belt. We talked about Austin’s late great citizen and beloved friend Governor Ann Richards, much admired by Miss Zellweger.

The young star has a direct yet diffident and even oh-so-slightly quirky personality. I was thinking of the first time I saw her with Tom Cruise in Jerry McGuire where he says to her: “You complete me.” There is a magnetic quality about the young woman that is elusive, almost as if you can’t quite get hold of her in your sight, and yet you can’t take your eyes off her. She’s very nice and very likeable.


Susan Gutfreund and Erwin Olaf

Last night; uptown and down. John and Susan Gutfreund hosted a cocktail party for Erwin Olaf, the Dutch photographer who is famous in the world for his commercial product photography and much admired in the art world for his work: www.erwinolaf.com.

The forty-something Mr. Olaf lives in Amsterdam although he loves traveling to New York (“the energy”).

Unlike many of his peers, he has a very outgoing personality and is very verbal, if you’ll pardon my generalizing.

I got there too late to hear his thirty-minute talk about his work but I was told the guests were rapt with attention. Even Bill Cunningham of the Times stayed on to listen and take it all in.

The Gutfreunds have a beautiful apartment overlooking the Park, with a kind of warm and cozy opulence, large and even grand, that reminds me of a Parisian apartment on the Quai d’Orsay.

Images by Erwin Olaf on display in the Gutfreund apartment.

The view at sundown overlooking the Park toward, left to right, the twin Time Warner towers, the Trump Building and the brand new 15 Central Park West luxury condominiums, with the roof of the Central Park Zoo in the foreground.

Among the guests: Katherine Bryan, Ellery and Marjorie Reed Gordon, Jean Doumanian, Jill Fairchild, Larry Kaiser, Kimberly DuRoss, Anne Bass, Agnes Gund, Richard Turley, Sofia Barclay, Luisana Mendoza, Nancy Richardson, Ralph Rucci (whose East Side penthouse is being decorated by Mrs. Gutfreund as of this writing), Pedro Girao, Deputy Chairman of Christie’s Europe, and Mark Langrish and many others.

Marjorie and Ellery Gordon with Jean Doumanian

Nancy Richardson, Ralph Rucci, and Katherine Bryan

Kimberly DuRoss and Agnes Gund

Sofia Barclay, Luisiana Mendoza, and Richard Turley

Anne Bass and Nancy Richardson

Mark Langrish and Pedro Girao

Meanwhile at the same hour down in Tribeca, Steven Sclaroff hosted a reception at his Tribeca gallery for the group of designers who with him created vignettes using furniture and decorative objects that will be part of the upcoming Sollo Rago Modern Auction in Lambertville, New Jersey on April 12th and 13th.

The five other designers -- called for the occasion, the Modern Masters, include Alexander Gorlin, Amy Lau, Juan Montoya, Matthew Patrick Smyth and Alison Spear with Marian McEvoy. Each created his or her own interpretation of mid-20th century design. These will be on view at the auction house pre-sale from April 5th through 11th.

The Scene at the Steven Sclaroff gallery

In the crowd: Suzanne Slesin, Frank Webb and Steve Schroko, Eric Gartner, David Rago, Sallie Brady, Joe Robbins, Brooke Mason, Wendy Moonan, Allison Mazzola, Alex Papachristidis, Marilyn White, Minette and Dorsey Reading, Suzanne Perrault, Christopher Mason, Linda O’Keeffe, Harry Heissman and some of the MM’s including Matthew Patrick Smyth, Amy Lau and Juan Montoya.

Alison Spear/Marian McEvoy

Juan Montoya

Amy Lau

Matthew Patrick Smyth

Alexander Gorlin

The event was organized by John Sollo, who is considered one of the leading experts on mid-20th century design. The sale will also feature the works of such modern design luminaries as Paul Evans (from the prized Dorsey Reading Collection which has never been on the market before), Isamu Noguchi, Thomas Lynn, Mark Newson, Wharton Esherick, Ettore Sotsass, George Nakashima, Andre Dubreuil, Gio Ponti, Phillip Lloyd Powell, Tony Duquette, Jean Royere, Wendell Castle, Tommi Parzinger, Billy Haines and many more.

For information visit www.ragoarts.com