Tag archives: Oprah
Billionaire Los Angeles developer Rick Caruso nearly came a cropper at the final hurdle when developing the Rosewood Miramar, he has revealed. Rick was at a ribbon cutting ceremony at the oh-so tony five star resort and recounted he was in our Eden by the Beach for the final hearing on his $200 million development, […]
Social gridlock reigned when developer John Price and wife, Janna, and business partners Tod and Audrey Berlinger, opened The Villas at Olive Mill, nearly 15 years after first submitting their building application and going through 28 hearings between 2004 and 2017. The Spanish colonial-style, three-story mixed-use property on the corner of Coast Village Road and […]
Terry Valeski and Pamela Strobel are new board directors at the Music Academy of the West. Terry will also serve as co-chair of the academy’s marketing committee, with Pamela serving on the education and outreach committee. He served as president and managing director of Pacific Bell, while she is the director of Domtar Corporation, Illinois […]
Montecito residents Eric and Nina Phillips, longtime Dream Foundation supporters, hosted 33-year-old Trezevant, Tennessee, resident Zachary Butler in Las Vegas. Zach, who has suffered from Friedrich’s Ataxia from an early age and was completely disabled by his teens, had always dreamed of meeting Canadian professional poker player Daniel Negreanu, winner of six World Series of […]
Montecito TV titan Oprah Winfrey, Kenny Loggins, and actor Rob Lowe paid tribute to the 23 people who lost their lives and many who lost everything a year ago, as our tony enclave was ravaged by catastrophic mudslides. Oprah, 64, was among hundreds of local residents taking part in the first anniversary vigil, walking from […]
The ballroom at the Hilton was packed when Human Rights Watch held its 12th annual Voices for Justice dinner, which raised around $600,000 for the 40-year-old nonprofit, which is a leading defender of fundamental freedoms, the activists who uphold them, and vulnerable people worldwide in 90 countries globally. The bustling bash for 460 guests, co-chaired […]
City College student Timothy Jimenez is displaying all the signs of success! The 20-year-old former Carpinteria High School student, who lives on the Mesa, has signed up for a four-year course to learn sign language, spurred on by his friendship with deaf football teammate Guillermo Tavira. “I really wanted to communicate with him and really […]
“It’s all Trump’s fault”! Leftists instantly reach for the “Hate-Trump Card” as a knee-jerk reaction to virtually every “crisis.” Do you remember Democrats and the seedier media blaming Robert (“F**k Trump”) De Niro for the shooting and attempted assassination of president Ronald Reagan? I don’t. A certified mental case shot at the president because, as […]
Santa Barbara Historical Museum’s Costume Council, which is restoring hundreds of clothes that have been stored in the museum’s 10,000-sq.-ft. basement for decades, hosted a lunch featuring Pulitzer Prize-winning author Bill Dedman, whose book Empty Mansions – about the late copper heiress Huguette Clark and her imposing 23-acre cliffside estate, Bellosguardo – was a New York […]
A large tent had been erected to protect the 420 guests at the sold-out 16th Gold Ribbon lunch for the Teddy Bear Cancer Foundation at the Biltmore from the blazing sun, but it served an entirely different purpose when the heavens opened, deluging the tony beachside hostelry in a rare rainstorm. Silent auction items had […]
It was all tu-tu much when the State Street Ballet threw its 24th anniversary gala for a record 184 guests in the Biltmore’s Loggia Ballroom, raising around $140,000 for the popular local dance company. The fab fete, which honored avid supporter Arlyn Goldsby, longtime board member and patron, was emceed by Jonatha King, with dance […]
TV talk-show titan Oprah Winfrey gave Montecito first responders her seal of approval when she attended the unveiling of a new U.S. Postal Service stamp. It includes a firefighter in red, a police officer in blue, and a paramedic in white, paying tribute to emergency personnel across America. The ceremony, with Oprah unveiling the stamp […]
At a special ceremony at Fire Station 1 last week, the United States Postal Service unveiled a commemorative Forever Stamp that honors first responders. USPS district manager Alfred Santos told the large crowd that he was moved to host the unveiling in Montecito, following the Thomas Fire and January mudslides, and the exceptional work of […]
Santa Barbara Polo Club’s hallowed Holden Field was turned into an outdoor planetarium when it threw an Under the Stars bash for 200 guests with organizers from the local 63-year-old astronomical unit, part of the Natural History Museum, which does 200 events annually showing off the stars above, just two days before a full moon. […]
It was certainly a night on the tiles when the Polo Training Center, a charitable organization which supports youth polo, held a sunset soirée on the Mirador roof of the Hotel Californian, courtesy of the ritzy hostelry’s manager, Carlos Lopes. The reception for more than 50 guests was the precursor for a golf tournament the […]
The Music Academy of the West’s popular 71st annual summer festival has been in full swing with concerts at Hahn Hall, the Lobero, and the Granada. At the Lobero, the festival artist series featured the world premiere of instrumentalist Timothy Higgins‘s entertaining work Nursery Crimes with soprano Deborah Voigt and a multi talented sextet, accompanying […]
After “kinging” as George III for the sixth year in the village July 4 parade, with Dallas dynamo Charles Ward, Santa Barbara Polo Club promoter, as George Washington, in a $418,000 two-toned Rolls Royce Dawn convertible lent by the O’Gara Coach Company in Westlake, with former Miss Alabama Tara Gray and ex Miss California, Kerri […]
Cabana Home, the interior design store owned by Steve and Caroline Thompson, was socially gridlocked when an old friend, artist Robyn Geddes, launched his latest exhibition of 21 works. Robyn, who I knew in New York in the late 1970s when he worked at Andy Warhol’s Factory – Andy’s East 66th townhouse was just a […]
It was some enchanted evening in the upper village when Vanity Fair writer Todd Purdum launched his new well-researched, 386-page book Something Wonderful: Rodgers and Hammerstein’s Broadway Revolution with a bibliophile bash at Tecolote, the lively literary lair. Purdum, who worked for The New York Times for more than 20 years as White House correspondent […]
PATH – People Assisting the Homeless – hit a definite home run with its second Making It Home tour, a sell-out event with 260 supporters taking a tour in eight trolleys – two more than last year – of four of our rarefied enclave’s toniest properties and raising around $75,000 for the nonprofit formed three […]
