Jewel Ball Keeps Making Waves
Given the right turn of mind, the Jewel Ball always seems more fantasy than fact, more an elaborate conceit than an event that actually takes place in time and space.
But, if it’s a fable, it’s also fabulous, and old hands who attended Saturday’s “Splash,” the 43rd annual edition of the Jewel Ball, were justified in viewing it as a fishwife’s tale--it had a thoroughly happy ending, not only for the 850 who attended, but for the 50-odd charities that will share in the take. Because the Jewel Ball typically ranks among the top 10 fund-raisers in the country, major beneficiaries can look forward to major donations. The 50 members of the sponsoring Las Patronas philanthropic group have earmarked money for the Center for Women’s Health at Sharp Memorial Hospital to equip a mammography center, for the San Diego Service Center for the Blind to build a model teaching apartment, and for the St. Vincent de Paul Center to acquire a new truck. Other major recipients include the local Girl Scout Council, La Jolla Chamber Music Society and the San Diego Historical Society.
Practical Yet Fanciful
Practical considerations fuel the Jewel Ball, which is the only grand-slam local event that raises funds for an ever-changing roster of charities, but make-believe gives the ball its spirit. The ball is the ultimate children’s party, but given by adults. The ball is the ultimate summer prom, but given for adults. The ball is a six-hour vacation from reality during which adults, confined only by the open sky and the brilliantly painted stage sets that define the event, can believe themselves to be in another dimension.
“Splash” was given on the tennis courts of the La Jolla Beach and Tennis Club, the only place the Jewel Ball ever has been given and probably the only place it could be given--the two seem as amiably inseparable as corned beef hash and poached eggs. Because the moody Pacific has endowed La Jolla with some of the priciest real estate this side of Manhattan, Las Patronas turned oceanward for inspiration and dredged up “Splash.”
The goldfish swimming in the glass globe centerpieces certainly found the scene more familiar than the guests, few of whom confessed to previous experience in attending an “underwater” ball. Chairman Gail Lichter designed the event to seem as if it were given at the foot of an unusually fashionable coral reef, which decorations chairwoman Anne Ricchiuti and former Sea World design chief George Yochum interpreted in sets painted with undersea scenes of tropical fish going about their piscatorial pursuits.
The ultimate cleverness was in the lighting, which undulated to give the effect of waves rolling overhead; the lighting was toned down during the dinner hour so as not to induce feelings of seasickness among the guests.
15 Months in the Works
“This theme is so pleasant,” Ricchiuti said. “Fish are nice.”
Lichter, her co-chairwoman Anne Coleman and their committee spent 15 months planning and building the props for “Splash,” and Lichter said that fish became more or less the central theme of her life during that period.
“My whole wardrobe has fish on it,” she said. “I don’t have earrings that aren’t shaped like fish. I even have fish salt and pepper shakers. In my house, fish are everywhere!” At the ball itself, Lichter contented herself with something more in the mermaid line, a slim aqua sheath that she topped with a lei of orchids thrown casually over her shoulders.
As one of the very few genuine balls in San Diego, “Splash” started late and ran late; guests were admitted for cocktails at 8 p.m., and dinner was served at 10 p.m. (“It’s so civilized an hour!” exclaimed a recently transplanted New Yorker), and dancing continuing unabated until 2 a.m.
Guests spent the opening hours traipsing across the traditional bridge set over the club’s pool (as many a wag suggested, the ball would have made a real splash had it given way and dumped the party-goers in the drink). Destinations on each side were hors d’oeuvres tables set with the Jewel Ball’s usual astonishing array of shellfish, caviar and other nibbles, which this year ran almost exclusively to the fishy and included spicy grilled ahi and catfish nubbins.
A Wave of Dancers
If Las Patronas intended “Splash” to give the effect of a tidal wave sweeping through the Beach and Tennis Club, the group got its wish to a degree when the Wayne Foster Orchestra struck up and opened the ball proper.
Guests spilled into the ballroom as if floodgates had been opened, a tide of gussied-up humanity washing into an area hung with seaweed-like vines and lit primarily by candle power. The purposeful dimness gave guests the impression that they were at least several fathoms under the sea, free to cavort with the anemones painted on the sets.
The centerpieces were a tad controversial in that they included not a single flower, but then, how many roses bloom beneath the waves? The goldfish in the bowls were admired, however, and swam undisturbed despite the inescapable comments about the ready availability of sushi. Lichter said she doubted that a centerpiece had ever previously been the subject of so much research.
“We’re dealing with something live, and Greenpeace would be pleased with the trouble we took,” she said. “We tested the water temperature hourly, in the sun, in the shade, at night. We even tested to see if the coral or shells we placed in the bowls would adversely affect the water quality.”
It must be admitted that some guests did stare pensively at the fish during the dinner of lobster tail and rolled filet of beef; the meal concluded with mousse-filled chocolate seashells garnished with marzipan mermaids.
The guest list seemed to reflect changing times on the charity circuit, and rather less of the La Jolla Old Guard turned out than formerly. However, at least one Las Patronas founding member, Jo Bobbi MacConnell, was on hand; she has attended most balls given since the party was inaugurated in 1947.
‘A Hardy Perennial’
“I’m a hardy perennial,” she said, adding cheerfully, “I’m just an old trout.”
Many others who have made attendance at the Jewel Ball a summer ritual were present, of course, including any number of retired Las Patronas who return to enjoy themselves after putting in the seven years of often grueling work required by membership in the group. Las Patronas President Judy Lessard suggested that this loyalty is rooted in something much deeper than the search for perfection in party-giving.
“I don’t look at the Jewel Ball as a social event,” she said. “I think of it in terms of its importance to San Diego charities. It gives our guests the chance to contribute to the betterment of our community. George Bush talked about a thousand points of light, and perhaps the Jewel Ball is one of them.”
Among those present were Doris and Dirk Broekema, June and Richard Fleck, Alice and Mike Cavanaugh, Ingrid and Joe Hibben, Tricia and Bill Kellogg, Richel and Tawfiq Khoury, Betsy and Doug Manchester, Dawn and Chuck Matthiesen, Molly and Chris McKellar, Katherine Sheridan with Ken Ventura, Sally and John Thornton, Margy and Mike West, Ouisa Pillsbury with John Barbey, Kris and Jeff Jeffery, Sally and Dennis Bucko, Gray and Kraig Kristofferson, Melesse and Bob Traylor, Pam and Steve Avoyer, Lynne and Sam Hall, Susie and Tom Armstrong, Marge and Paul Palmer, Betsy and John Anthony, Mary Williams with Ted Graham, Liz and Hugh Huddleston, and attorney Craig McClellan with his wife, Susan, who will chair the 1990 Jewel Ball.
