Guests See No Reason to Change the Chanel
What do you wear to a black-tie fest staged in a Chanel boutique?
Something by Chanel, of course. And, in the case of Jolene Engel, something very California--a sea-blue sequin-paved “wet suit” with handbag to match.
“She left her surfboard at home,” joked her husband, Dick Engel, reaching for a French pastry pouf filled with carmelized onions at the affair staged for Opera Pacific.
Good thing. The boutique at South Coast Plaza was so loaded with tables and fashionable folk, there just wasn’t room to park a Hobie.
Guests won the chance to attend the unique gathering Sunday by purchasing raffle tickets at Opera Pacific’s recent “La Boheme” founders’ gala.
“One hundred tickets at $100 each were bought,” said Chanel boutique director Roger Martin, mastermind of the bash. But only 18 couples could attend the dinner (more, and things would have been stuffy). Opera Pacific estimates that about $10,000 was raised by the event.
“I feel lucky to be here,” said opera buff Floss Schumacher, who attended with her husband, Ed. “This is better than the lottery!”
Whipping up French cuisine was Pascal Olhats, owner of Newport Beach’s popular Pascal bistro (a favorite eatery of the likes of Joseph Wambaugh, Dean Koontz, Peter Ueberroth and Henry Segerstrom).
The chic menu would have made Coco proud: lobster and scallops St. Jacques with caviar vinaigrette, filet of veal with truffle cream and Charlotte a la Chanel, a symphony of white and dark chocolate, served with a Robert Mondavi 1979 Cabernet Sauvignon reserve, and presented on a dish “signed” in chocolate powder with the Chanel logo.
“I made the powder out of chocolate and 22-karat gold,” Olhats noted proudly. (One couldn’t eat the gold-laced fairy dust, but it sure made for exotic eye shadow.)
Guests were free to roam the marble-clad boutique and ogle Chanel’s fall collection as they sipped their Vichon Chevrignon 1990 during the pre-dinner reception. But there were no salespeople putting on the pressure. “Tonight is simply a night to celebrate our association with Opera Pacific,” Martin said. (Chanel christened its Costa Mesa boutique with supporters of Opera Pacific.)
After dinner, taken at tables spread with white-on-white tablecloths, gardenias and candlelight, guests enjoyed dessert and champagne in the Chanel “drawing room,” a special area, set with tiny tables, in the mall. Up for oohing and ahhing: a heart-stoppingly beautiful preview of Puccini’s “La Boheme” (opening at the Orange County Performing Arts Center on Sept. 12) sung by the production’s stars--Jan Grissom (Musetta), Cesar Hernandez (Rodolfo) and Stella Zamballis (Mimi).
Also among guests: Donna Bunce, co-chairwoman with Gayle Anderson of the Strauss-themedNov. 14 Opera Ball at the Disneyland Hotel (“It’s going to be Orange County’s most romantic ball ever,” Bunce rhapsodized, “we’ll have 40 sparkling chandeliers. . . .”); Robert and Maxine Gibson; Bill and Barbara Roberts; Opera Pacific director David DiChiera; Tara and Niles Gates; Susie and Daniel Hernandez; Ann and Robert McLean; Pilar Wayne; Regina McGrath; Barbara and Arthur Powell, and Jeanette Nad Louis Knobbe.
