An opening worthy of a Hollywood premiere

There was something vaguely incongruous about the two of them together, squeezed into a corner of the small, posh room. Lynda Carter in layers of black, still Wonder Womanly after all these years, if admittedly more glam-ex-actress-matron now, and Blaine Trump, a porcelain doll in pastels with the well-tuned manners and well-blonded ‘do of a fundraising socialite. They had the practiced obliviousness of the much-photographed, not offering acknowledgment of the flashing bulbs in their faces unless asked, at which point they performed beautifully.

Their husbands, Washington attorney Robert Altman and The Donald’s brother Robert Trump, were out between the ivied walls of the red-brick courtyard talking to the host and star of the show, interior designer Greg Jordan, who stayed pretty much locked in place all evening under the white iron railings and the droopy canopy of ficus leaves that I briefly mistook for moss. Except for the steady parade of column-fodder types with familiar names and faces that you couldn’t always connect, it could have been a pre-Mardi Gras event in the French Quarter, without the bourbon and high jinks.

The whole atmosphere felt distinctly New Orleans, but maybe I was led astray by Jordan’s unvarnished Louisiana accent pulling me back to our mutual home state. No amount of the usual internal party resistance, having to push and bump my way through a haute-coutured and highly toned mob turning down the splendid hors d’oeuvres, could quash that strangely homey sensation. This despite being at a Los Angeles reception for a New York decorator in a John Wolfe-designed retail space hosted by the Trumps and the Altmans, who had flown in for the event; blockbuster movie producer Jerry Bruckheimer and his wife, Linda; and baseball giant Cal Ripken Jr. and his wife, Kelly. Jordan was grandly opening his shop and studio at 8450 Melrose Place and celebrating his bicoastal migration, a move he was encouraged to make by Larry David of “Curb Your Enthusiasm” and his wife, Lori, whose Martha’s Vineyard house Jordan decorated.

Les Moonves, head honcho of CBS, was there, and so were actor Christian Slater and his wife, Ryan Haddon; “Wings” star Steven Weber; Kyle MacLachlan of “Sex and the City”; Molly Sims of “Las Vegas”; composer David Foster; entertainment attorney Jake Bloom (who represents our new governor); Liz Goldwyn of the Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer Goldwyns; “American Rhapsody” producer and actress Colleen Camp; producer John Davis and his wife, Jordan; “Forrest Gump” and “Alex and Emma” producer Steve Tisch and his wife, Jamie; Wendy Goldberg, whose husband is “Charlie’s Angels” (TV and film) producer Leonard Goldberg; yacht mogul Jamie Edmiston -- I could go on and on if I actually knew the whole guest list, a big one for a not terribly big space.

So many people came, in fact -- almost none of them actually clients of Jordan’s -- that I couldn’t really see what the store and studio were all about, couldn’t locate the cashmere throws or really try out the red-lipstick-leather sofa that was the one thing that was hard to miss even in this shiny crowd. I got wedged into a room with a dining table filling up with empty wine glasses and starched linen cocktail napkins, where I spent a pleasant half-hour or so talking about Jordan and his rise to interior design fame with lifelong friends of his from Monroe, La., TV host and newspaper columnist Victor Cascio and his wife, Marie, who was wearing tight jeweled pants and looking Hollywood-hip even though she’s the grandmother of five, as I recall.

They too had flown in for the occasion, along with Jordan’s mother, who returned to Monroe after 10 years of working in her son’s New York office -- which, of course, he’s not closing just because he’s opening here. Business is big at the East Coast headquarters. But he was spending lots of long weekends here, making friends galore, and finally Larry David convinced him he ought to just put down some roots.

And before you knew it, he’d found a John Wolfe house that was built for George Cukor, took it, found a Wolfe commercial property, took it, and now, here he was on Monday night, the very epitome of the curious phenomenon of designer as the hot new star of the decade.

*

Barbara King is editor of the Home section. She can be reached at barbara.king@latimes.com.