The Crowd: Two decades of decorating lives
The Decorative Arts Society (DARTS) in Newport Beach is celebrating its 20th anniversary in 2015.
This close-knit and cultured group of design advocates comes together for a series of incredibly informative lectures throughout the season on a variety of topics associated with the broad realm of decorative arts. The focus of these experiences falls on special guest artists brought in from around the country and around the world to speak to the local crowd.
Kicking off the 20th anniversary series this month, Ulysses Dietz, chief curator of decorative arts at the Newark Museum in New Jersey, flew to Orange County last week to address the society on “From Arts to Arts & Crafts: What Happened When Pots Became Art?”
Dietz charmed society members at a Monday evening cocktail reception held in his honor at a swank bayfront estate in Newport Beach. Loyal society members attending included Sandra Ayres, Toni Berlinger, Hyla and Richard Bertea, Cathi Bledsoe, the lovely France and Richard Campbell, and David and Barbara Cline.
Many of Newport’s top design professionals support the Decorative Arts Society. Among the notables attending the Dietz reception were Randy Boyd and Choo Choo Boyer, John Benecke, Diane and Harry Johnson, Elana Donovan, Barbara and Jim Glabman, Marion and Roger Palley, Ann and Bill Dennis and, from the world of chic designer consignment in Newport Beach, the fabulous Kitty Canada, whose furniture and accessory empire now includes two shops on Pacific Coast Highway and a third location on Superior Avenue in Costa Mesa, all appropriately named The Find.
What is special about this organization is that multiple generations of local people fascinated by the decorative arts come together in a uniquely collaborative way for an experience that is not just fun but also educational, cultural and, perhaps most important of all, charitable. Funds raised at these receptions and lectures are donated each season to Orange County nonprofits that assist families, particularly women and children in need of support.
For the past 20 years, the Decorative Arts Society has raised and donated more than $1.5 million to a cross-section of worthy nonprofits. Each year, an executive committee of DARTS supporters select, research and interview potential recipients of the DARTS grants. Many institutions are awarded year after year for their continuing work in the community, and each year, new charities are considered as well.
This season, DARTS is welcoming new, younger members to the society, including Anne Michaelson Yahn and Don Yahn, Erin Lavelle, Suzanne Desforges and Christin Ellis. Also celebrating in the DARTS crowd were Leslie Barish, Judy and Bill Brady, Carol and Bruce Andrews, Marge and Jeff Lewis, Judy and Jim Montgomery, Kim Donahue, Carolyn Garrett, Sharon Henwood, Mary Anna and Arthur Jeppe, and Maralou and Jerry Harrington.
VIP sightings also found Carole and Barry Steele, Judy Threshie, Lois and Dave Tingler, Marilyn and Bill Robbins and Janet Curci Welsh supporting DARTS. For more information on DARTS, contact Hillary Niblo at hniblo@att.net.
THE CROWD runs Fridays. B.W. Cook is editor of the Bay Window, the official publication of the Balboa Bay Club in Newport Beach.
