WAG Magazine December 2017

JAMES BLAKE

Aces a new cause

MELISSA MANCHESTER In tune with the ‘Fellas’

LIDIA BASTIANICH

Flavors of the season

INDIA.ARIE

Lends her voice for change

AMY KAHN RUSSELL

No stone unturned

HOLIDAY MARKETS

A European odyssey +

FITNESS & HEALTH

JUDGED A

TOP

wrapping up the year with grace

MAGAZINE

IN NEW YORK STATE 2014, 2015, 2016

WESTCHESTER & FAIRFIELD LIFE

DECEMBER 2017 | WAGMAG.COM

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®ROBERTOCOIN

NEW BAROCCO & CENTO COLLECTIONS

®ROBERTOCOIN

SYMPHONY COLLECTION

CONTENTS DECEMBER 2017

12

46

16

50

20

52

24

54

28

56

30

58

34

60

38

64

42

94

Profiles in grace

‘Unchain’ melody

A rainbow of creativity

Nice guys finish first

Saluting ‘The Fellas’ in song

The nature of jewelry

Enter the dragon

A true Viennese treat

A most fabulous footprint

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COVER STORY

DAVID HALLBERG

Ambassador of Italian cuisine

A future for the autistic

Now pitching for Phelps Hospital

Imperial treatment for an American president Icy plung for a hot cause

The fabric of design

Inspired by a child…

A family’s farming legacy

Feeding the body and soul

This page Pucker Up, one of the new designs in the Allison Eden Pop Art Collection. The festive fabric collection is a collaboration between Brooklyn-based mosaic artist Allison Eden and LebaTex, a Hudson Valley-based textile supplier. Courtesy LebaTex.

E VERY OB J ECT HAS A STORY

worth telling, worth find ing.

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FEATURES H I G H LI G HTS

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WAY Country chic meets country comfort

76

WARES Holiday lights

78

WEAR A lady of grace

88

WEAR Fairy-tale faces

90

WEAR Made in the U.S.A.

92

WEAR No price above them

96

WHAT’S COLLECTIBLE A living legend

100

WANDERS The lure of Continental Christmas markets

102

WANDERS Born to be Alpenwild

104

WANDERS The thrill of the holiday market hunt

108

WONDERFUL DINING Upscale Italian at Sergio’s

112

WINE & DINE ‘Come as a guest…’

114

WHETTING THE APPETITE Jackie Ruby’s Vodka-Infused Meyer Lemon Pound Cake

116

WHERE ARE THEY NOW? Chiara Boni’s comfortable luxury

118

WEAR A hairdresser dispensing more than a good cut

120

WELL Bend it like Lincoln

122

PET OF THE MONTH Darling Doo Drop

123

PET PORTRAITS Four-legged bookworms

126

WHEN & WHERE Upcoming events

130

WATCH We’re out and about

144

WIT How do you maintain grace under pressure?

90 68 108

COVER:

David Hallberg, the only American ever to dance with the Bolshoi Ballet as a member of the company, strikes a dramatic pose in a studio portrait at his home company, American Ballet Theatre.

See story on page 72.

Photograph by Erin Baiano.

Courtesy American Ballet Theatre.

COVER STORY

100

122

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HEADQUARTERS A division of Westfair Communications Inc., 3 Westchester Park Drive, White Plains, NY 10604 Telephone: 914-694-3600 | Facsimile: 914-694-3699 Website: wagmag.com | Email: ggouveia@westfairinc.com All news, comments, opinions, findings, conclusions or recommendations in WAG are those of the authors and do not constitute opinions, findings, conclusions or recommendations of the publication, its publisher and its editorial staff. No portion of WAG may be reproduced without permission.WAG is distributed at select locations, mailed directly and is available at $24 a year for home or office delivery. To subscribe, call 914-694-3600, ext. 3020. All advertising inquiries should be directed to Anne Jordan at 914694-3600, ext. 3032 or email anne@westfairinc.com. Advertisements are subject to review by the publisher and acceptance for WAG does not constitute an endorsement of the product or service. WAG (Issn: 1931-6364) is published monthly and is owned and published by Westfair Communications Inc. Dee DelBello, CEO, dee@westfairinc.com

WAGGERS

TH E TALENT B EH I N D O U R PAG E S

JENA A. BUTTERFIELD

ROBIN COSTELLO

RYAN DEFFENBAUGH

ALEXANDRA DELBELLO

JANE K. DOVE

ALEESIA FORNI

GINA GOUVEIA

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COVER STORY, PG.72 GEORGETTE GOUVEIA

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EDITOR'S LETTER GEORGETTE GOUVEIA

I

Bil Donovan’s fashion illustration of me with a pink Louis Vuitton handbag was part of our day of curated shopping with Avril Graham of Harper’s Bazaar at The Westchester. (Page 78).

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have long wanted to do an issue devoted to grace and December’s annual exploration of philanthropy seems to be as good a time as any.

What is grace? It’s a question we pose directly in our opening essay and more obliquely in our cover story. And it is a question answered by the people you will meet in these pages but perhaps most pointedly by James Blake and David Hallberg — the subjects of our opening essay and cover story respectively.

In its most obvious form, grace is about physical elegance and Blake, a former tennis star, and Hallberg, a principal dancer with American Ballet Theatre, are surely graceful in that sense.

There is also “grace under pressure,” grace developed in adversity.

The Yonkers- and Fairfield-reared Blake and Hallberg, who spoke recently at the Jacob Burns Film Center in Pleasantville, have both overcome bigotry and career-threatening injuries to return to their professions and give back to others — Blake by becoming an advocate for racial equality in the criminal justice system, a subject detailed in his new book “Ways of Grace”; and Hallberg by establishing a ballet scholarship for boys and mentoring them.

This brings us to the third type of grace, the one we bestow on others. It may take the form of graciousness in defeat. Here’s what Melissa Manchester told our music writer Gregg about those who may have disappointed her.

“When the answer that you want doesn’t come back, you have to get peaceful and say, ‘Whether they know it or not, they are loved from afar….’ That’s all that’s important.”

Or the form of hospitality. As one Portuguese vintner told Doug, our resident Bacchus, “You come as a guest, you leave as a friend.”

Often the grace we bestow is born in sorrow and tempered by courage. Read Danielle’s story on India.Arie’s and the

New Canaan-based Grace Farms Foundation’s quest to end modern slavery.

Or her take on Ryan Flaim, who founded the company Orange Lining to empower children and remember the nephew she lost too young.

Or Jena’s piece on New Yorker editor David Remnick, the father of an autistic teen and a board member of NEXT for AUTISM. Or Jane’s interview with Jim Goldberg, Phelps Hospital volunteer extraordinaire, who delivers the newspaper to patients and comfort and inspiration to youngsters. Or Phil’s appreciation of Jay Leno, a onetime New Rochelle resident, who performed recently at Purchase College to benefit Family Services of Westchester. Or Ryan’s article on ALS sufferer and Yonkers resident Pat Quinn, who co-founded the Ice Bucket Challenge to help others with this incurable disease. These are all “ways of grace.”

But in bestowing grace on others we may in turn receive a grace that is ineffable and transcendent. Here we spotlight WAG hairstylist Brian. His column has never been your typical stylist’s column but then, Brian, a feeling person, is not your typical stylist.

In his encounter with a homeless man in midtown Manhattan — and the act of kindness he performed for him — he found himself touched by the divine.

We at WAG wish you that touch of grace in this season of light and throughout the year to come.

Georgette Gouveia is the author of the new “The Penalty for Holding” (Less Than Three Press) and “Water Music” (Greenleaf Book Group). They’re part of her series of novels, “The Games Men Play,” also the name of the sports/culture blog she writes at thegamesmenplay.com. Readers may find her novel “Seamless Sky” and weekly installments of her “Daimon: A Novel of Alexander the Great” on wattpad.com.

Profiles in grace

BY GEORGETTE GOUVEIA

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DECEMBER 2017

and head to the Open, where he was scheduled to make some corporate appearances in his role as chairman of the United States Tennis Association Foundation. But at the urging of his wife, Emily, Blake — the grandson of a New York City police officer — decided to speak about the incident at the Open. The subsequent he-said, they-said resulted in a media storm that has had ripple effects.

(On Oct. 3, the arresting officer, James Frascatore, filed suit in federal court against Blake for defamation as well as against New York City, its police department and the department’s Civilian Review Board for their handling of the case.)

“Two years later the incident is still with me, and I am forever changed by it,” Blake writes in his new book,“Ways of Grace: Stories of Activism, Adversity, and How Sports Can Bring Us TogethChristian theology holds that grace is the uner” (Amistad/HarperCollinsPublishers, $26.99, merited favor freely bestowed by God. But as 240 pages). “I’ve spent some of those years wonPresident John F. Kennedy noted in his inaugural dering how to address it, the injustice of it, as it address, “…here on earth God’s work must truly be relates not only to me but to anyone who has had our own.” And so perhaps grace is something that a run-in or altercation with law enforcement.” we bestow on others and, in so doing, on ourselves.

Blake has taken comfort, courage and inspiraOn Sept. 9, 2015, James Blake, the Yonkers- and tion from Arthur Ashe, the onetime Westchester Fairfield-reared tennis star, was waiting outside County resident who was the first African-Amerthe Grand Hyatt New York near Grand Central Terican to win the men’s singles titles at Wimbledon minal for a car to take him to the US Open when and the US Open and to be ranked No. 1 in the his life changed forever. A man ran up to him and world. Despite contracting HIV from a blood shoved him to the ground, handcuffing him. The transfusion during his second heart operation in man was a plainclothes police officer, who, with 1983, Ashe continued his activism, adding AIDS five other plainclothes officers, was there to arrest awareness to a portfolio that included inner-city him for alleged criminal activity — despite Blake’s tennis programs in the United States, the quest protestations and offers to produce ID. to end apartheid in South Africa and protests It wasn’t until another, older officer arrived, against U.S. treatment of Haitian refugees. (The Blake said, that the police realized that they had last took place in 1992, the year before he died.) made a terrible mistake. This officer apologized to Ashe’s memoir “Days of Grace,” inspired “Ways Blake, who just wanted to forget the whole thing of Grace: Stories of Activism, Adversity and How Sports Can Bring Us Together.” The book is a kind of athletic “Profiles in Courage,” recounting how men and women in various sports have used life’s challenges to transform the lives of others. It is a timely book that will leave you wanting more. Not surprisingly, it includes a profile of former San Francisco 49ers quarterback Colin Kaepernick, whose 2016 protest of racial inequality, which found him kneeling for the National Anthem before games, has ignited a firestorm from the gridirons of the NFL to the White House.

Kaepernick now lives in New York, where he continues to work out and give away a pledged $1 million, mostly to small nonprofits.

Just as unsurprisingly, the book also includes a number of tennis players. Some like Billie Jean King and Martina Navratilova — legendary singles and doubles players who are James Blake at the US Open in 2012, opposite, and working with youngster, also longtime women’s and gay rights above. Photographs courtesy USTA.

WHAT IS GRACE? IS IT THE CURVING ELEGANCE OF THE TENNIS PLAYER’S SERVE OR THE SKATER’S LAYBACK SPIN? THE FINESSE OF THE BALLET DANCER’S OR BOXER’S FOOTWORK? OR IS IT THE POISE OF THE PERFORMER OR ATHLETE WHO HAS “MET WITH TRIUMPH AND DISASTER” AND LEARNED TO “TREAT THOSE TWO IMPOSTORS JUST THE SAME,” IN THE WORDS OF KIPLING?

James Blake working with youngsters, top, and with his new book.

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activists — will be familiar to you.

Others, like Ana Ivanovic and Novak Djokovic — former No. 1 players who were sometime doubles partners — will be less so. The two grew up in Serbia, learning to play tennis in the safety of a drained-out, specially outfitted swimming pool in Belgrade as NATO bombs rained down on their country during the Balkan crisis.

Today, they help disadvantaged children in their own country and throughout the world — she through the Quercus Foundation, he through the Novak Djokovic Foundation and both as UNICEF ambassadors.

While Ivanovic and Djokovic were practicing between bomb bursts in the 1990s, Blake — some eight years older — was playing on the courts of Harlem and Harvard University, turning pro in 1999, his sophomore year. In a sense, he owes his life to the game: His British-born mother, Betty, and African-American father, Tom, met and fell in love on the court.

Soon, Blake and his older brother, Thomas, were playing doubles with their parents in Harlem. “Even when we moved from Yonkers up to Connecticut,” he writes, “on the weekends we still headed down to the courts in Harlem.”

At his father’s urging, Blake decided to quit other sports at 13 to focus on tennis. He was re-

warded with a career that took him to the No. 4 world ranking and key roles in two Hopman Cups and the 2007 Davis Cup for the United States.

But for all its balletic beauty, tennis can be a brutal sport. In 2004, Blake slipped on a clay court in Rome, hitting a net post and breaking his neck. His annus horribilis continued as he lost his father to stomach cancer and suffered a case of shingles that left his face partially paralyzed and his vision blurred.

Tennis players, however, are nothing if not resilient. Blake worked his way back in 2005, accepting a wild card at the US Open, where he lost to Andre Agassi in a memorable five-set quarterfinal match that had Agassi declaring, “I wasn’t the winner. Tennis was.”

Blake was named the Comeback Player of the Year and recounted his struggles in the memoir “Breaking Back.”

Three years later, he was named Arthur Ashe Humanitarian of the Year, in part for his fundraising for cancer research and, through his foundation, raising seed money for cutting-edge science.

He retired from the tour in 2013.

Since becoming an advocate for change in policing, Blake, who now lives in San Diego with his wife and two daughters, writes that he has lost a few friends. But he goes on: “What has also changed is my perception that there is nothing I can do to prevent the indignity of what happened to me from happening to someone else….To that end, I am going to use what I have, to do what I can.”

For more, visit jamesblaketennis.com.

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Grammy Award-winning singer-songwriter India. Arie gave a captivating performance at Grace Farms Foundation recently in support of efforts to end modern slavery.

Photograph Š Hogarth Worldwide. Courtesy Grace Farms Foundation.

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‘Unchain’ melody

BY DANIELLE RENDA

TINA FRUNDT WALKED OUTSIDE FOR A BREATH OF FRESH AIR. The then 14-year-old from Chicago was celebrating her birthday, which her parents cut short with a 7 p.m. curfew. Looking for an ear to share her frustrations, she confided in a seemingly genuine friend.

Little did she know that this discussion, innocent on her end, would result in her being kidnapped and taken across state lines to Ohio, kept in a padlocked room without windows, forced into modern-day slavery — and then prosecuted for it.

Frundt, now 31, is one of 40 million people worldwide who have fallen victim to sex trafficking, forced labor, debt bondage, child marriage or child militias, resulting in a $150 billion industry, according to the United Nations. Before an audience of some 350 people at the Grace Farms Foundation in New Canaan, she courageously spoke of resilience — and reality.

“Every day, I have to convince people that my trafficking situation happened here in the United

States,” she says, “and I then have to convince them that it’s still going on every single day. I was hidden in plain sight.”

Frundt is now the founder and executive director of Courtney’s House, a New York-based organization that serves underage victims of sex trafficking. She is also a member of the U.S. Advisory Council on Human Trafficking. She joined survivor Aklima Bibi, Grammy Award-winning singer-songwriter and philanthropist India.Arie and policymakers and executives alike, to speak on behalf of the Unchain Campaign, a multimedia effort to raise awareness about modern slavery.

The campaign, which is slated to launch in January 2019, was founded in November 2015 by Krishna Patel, its general counsel and director, and Rob Khattabi, director of safety and its adviser.

“I think change is something that is never straightforward,” Patel says. “It is only through our collective humanity that we can rise to our greatest potential.”

That collective humanity has led to the enactment of Public Act No. 16-71, a Connecticut state law that requires the heightened prosecution of traf-

fickers, increases the age of protected individuals from age 16 to 18 and calls for the detailed collection of data to facilitate a greater understanding of the crime.

In addition, the law mandates the annual reporting of trafficking cases, the development of training programs for identifying and reporting trafficking and the recognition of trafficking crimes to include the use of digital technologies to lure minors.

But despite this, far more work lies ahead. The National Human Trafficking Hotline, a service created to help victims and survivors, has reported 1,438 and 214 cases in the states of New York and Connecticut, respectively, since 2012. While Patel says there are some 2,100 national, nongovernmental organizations that are dedicated to eradicating modern-day slavery, having thus far raised $150 million toward that end, this is a mere dent in an underground industry that operates at 1,000 times this magnitude.

The Campaign has since partnered with New York-based WPP agencies Geometry Global and J. Walter Thompson, as well as London-based Shazaam and Stamford-based Thomson Reuters, whose executives were in attendance. Its slogan is “Freedom Needs Fighters.” The hummingbird logo symbolizes that need.

Bibi, a United Kingdom barrister, human rights

Guests were invited to write their own messages of hope on paper birds, which characterized the “Unchain” Campaign’s hummingbird logo. These individual creations were then hung together, and configured into a larger, unified hummingbird-shaped collage, representing how change is the result of individual action. Photograph © Hogarth Worldwide. Courtesy Grace Farms Foundation.

lawyer and journalist, is, like Frundt, a survivor. Engaged by the age of 9, Bibi was taken from the United Kingdom to Bangladesh and forced to marry as a teenager. While married, she was drugged and abused by the man she refers to as her “so-called husband.”

“I didn’t say any vows,” she says. “I don’t know who said it, but I was supposed to be married.”

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DECEMBER 2017

After several years, she managed to escape, going on to pursue several degrees and certifications.

Now, she says she uses this gift of knowledge to help remove others from such a dire situation.

“We can’t stop until the fight is done. I am determined,” Bibi says. “I may have struggled, but I fought and I am a dreamer, unchained today, with a mission to unchain many other modern-day slaves.”

The evening, which raised $500,000, culminated in a performance by India.Arie, which was met with a standing ovation. The performer, known for her advocacy for the Half the Sky Movement — an initiative to end female oppression — sang her “Soulbird Rise,” which includes these lyrics: “I believe in open doors, “I’m outside of the box, “What did not demolish me, “Simply polished me, “Now the clearer I can see.”

“My intention is to spread love, healing, peace and joy,” Arie says. “The door should be open for everyone.”

For more about the Unchain Campaign, visit unchain.org. For information and statistics about human trafficking in this country, visit humantraffickinghotline.org. For more on Grace Farms, visit gracefarms.org.

DECEMBER 2017

WAGMAG.COM

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A rainbow of creativity

BY MARY SHUSTACK

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ALLISON EDEN LIVES IN A WILDLY COLORFUL WORLD. That was clear from the moment we first met the glass mosaic artist back in May at the International Contemporary Furniture Fair in Manhattan.

Her booth was a vibrant showcase of the handcrafted work of Allison Eden Studios in Brooklyn, where she has long created unique custom designs for residential and commercial clients around the world.

Dressed in one of her signature riot-of-color outfits, Eden hinted about a new collaboration to bring her work to the home-goods market before memorably summing up her outlook.

“I try to really push the button on what you can do,” she told us. “Why live in a beige room?”

We kept thinking of that encounter on a recent morning, one that finds us sitting at a conference table strewn with fabrics depicting Allison Eden designs.

We’re in the Nanuet headquarters of LebaTex, the veteran textile supplier noted for its work in the hospitality, commercial and health care industries.

We’re getting a sneak peek at the first designs of the Allison Eden Pop Art Collection, a collaboration that signals a new creative direction for both parties — Eden’s first foray into fabrics, for drapery, bedding and upholstery, and LebaTex’s first artist collaboration.

A rainbow of color is interpreted in shapes sometimes geometric and other times organic, in iconic images and with an overriding sense of exuberance in more than a dozen patterns with names such as Blue Jewel, Amore, Pucker Up, Marble Trellis, Groovy Halo and Funky Stix.

It’s all vivid — and the eventual result of LebaTex founder Stacy Garcia’s own memorable first encounter with Eden.

“My history with Allison goes back years,” Garcia says, noting she first met the artist at a Florida tile and stone trade show, captivated by both Eden, “a vision in vintage Pucci,” and her work.

Since then, she says, they “admired each other from a distance” until Garcia finally approached Eden.

“I said, ‘Have you thought about taking your mosaics into fabrics?’” — and that was the start of what has now come to colorful fruition.

Mosaic artist Allison Eden, opposite, pictured at the International Contemporary Furniture Fair in Manhattan. Photograph by Mary Shustack. Complex Cubes, above, is one of the 13 designs featured in the Allison Eden Pop Art Collection. The new line represents a collaboration between Allison Eden Studios of Brooklyn and LebaTex, the Nanuet-based textile supplier. Courtesy LebaTex.

THE COLLABORATION From the start, the goal was to create a product that reflected Eden’s lively work, to “capture the essence, so it wouldn’t be flat,” Garcia says.

And indeed, the fabrics, sold through the trade, are unique in their luminosity.

Evidence abounds in an early project. One of Eden’s interior design clients was working on a Hamptons home and given access to the collection before it was officially unveiled at BD/NY,

a Boutique Design Trade Fair, held in mid-November in Manhattan.

Even Eden was impressed by the fabric’s effect on a bathroom.

“The whole thing was white and they added these great drapes and poof,” she says. “A lot of people are so afraid to go into color … drapery, upholstery is such a great way to go into that.”

The strength of the collection as a whole, Garcia says, is that it truly translates Eden’s spirit and her artistry.

“She has a vision that’s beyond,” Garcia says. “She personifies it. She has a base who want it through the lens of Allison.”

And the more the world sees of Eden, the more it wants, Garcia says.

“I think ultimately, we as human beings… we want to have a little fun,” she says.

But it’s not simply playful, she adds.

“It’s a way to put art, not framed on a wall… even if it is a drape, it’s an art piece.”

AT HOME WITH COLOR Eden feels there is an innate power to the work.

“I love coming home,” she says of her own color-filled surroundings. “There’s no place I’d rather be. Your home should be your sanctuary, a place that makes you happy to go to.”

And color, she says, is key to that happiness, as she came to truly realize thanks to a commission to create 1,000 square feet of glass-mosaic wall finishings for an Alaskan hospital. Working on site, in a place where literal darkness is a part of the environment, she was told again and again how vital the colorful work was to the mental health of all who saw it.

“We need color to survive,” she learned.

And it can be whatever color you want, as all the Allison Eden designs are part of the LebaTex M.O.D. Fabric Program — which can be modified for color and scale on more than 20 base cloths, for as little as a single yard.

The “mod” is a clever choice of phrase, reflecting both the Mod sensibility of the patterns but also the “Manufactured-On-Demand” program.

The new collection is the latest step for Eden, who in her third decade in the business is finding outlets for her creativity continue to evolve.

“I’m just really excited,” she says. “I think it’s something new and fresh. I think the interior design world needs new and exciting all the time.”

For Eden, it’s the culmination of a road that began in California, where she grew up in La Jolla before coming East to attend the Fashion Institute of Technology in Manhattan.

“I went actually for fashion design but I always loved interiors,” she says, before adding with a laugh.

“I was really terrible at sewing.”

She wanted to incorporate fashion and interior

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A selection of fabrics from the Allison Eden Pop Art Collection adds a real pop to this room. Courtesy LebaTex.

design and making art “all rolled into one,” so after graduation she would “walk around the Garment Center (and) see if anyone wanted to renovate.”

She’d have examples of her glass work on her at all times.

“Everyone thought I was crazy, ‘What are you carrying in your purse?’” she says.

From an early project — a commission to create a mosaic floor for a Burger King on 46th Street — she has never looked back. Today, her designs grace hotels and boutiques, restaurants, casinos, art galleries and private homes.

This month, her work can also be seen in the holiday windows of Bloomingdale’s in Manhattan. Her dramatic, aquatic mural design of last year led to her being invited back. This year, two Allison Eden windows have been created as part of the tribute to “The Greatest Showman,” the Hugh Jackman film depicting the story of P.T. Barnum.

For Eden, it’s just about a full-circle moment.

“The circus is really about people that didn’t fit in becoming stars,” she says. “I’ve always been different than everybody.”

And with her windows — and new fabric line — it’s clearly time to celebrate those differences.

For more, visit allisoneden.com or allisonedenstudios on Instagram; or LebaTex.com.

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Nice guys finish first

BY PHIL HALL

Jay Leno with President Barack Obama in April 2009.

Photograph by Pete Souza.

“WHEN YOU WORK IN SHOW BUSINESS, YOU GET PAID STUPID MONEY FOR SILLY THINGS,” JAY LENO SAYS IN A RECENT HOLLYWOOD REPORTER PODCAST INTERVIEW. OF COURSE, ENTERTAINMENT SUCCESS INVOLVES BEING IN THE RIGHT PLACE AT THE RIGHT TIME, AND LENO VIEWS THE CURRENT LATE-NIGHT LANDSCAPE WITH ITS HEAVY EMPHASIS ON TRUMP-BASHING AS NOT BEING THE PLACE WHERE HE WOULD FEEL COMFORTABLE.

“I was lucky,” he continues in his podcast chat. “I did it at a time when Bush was dumb and Clinton was horny … I don't like Trump, I can't stand the guy, I don't like him personally. But the constant negative Trump stuff on a nightly basis? I think it has a debilitating effect on people. People are just, ‘Oh, gosh, I don't wanna watch TV anymore. This is just the same thing every night.’”

In early November, the former host of “The Tonight Show” was certainly in the right place at the right time, headlining “The Really Big Show” at Purchase College’s Performing Arts Center, which raised funds for the Big Brothers Big Sisters of Family Services of Westchester. For Leno, the event was a homecoming of sorts: He was born and spent his first nine years in New Rochelle, and the gala returned him to the stand-up format where he has reigned for four decades and continues to appear in an average of 210 engagements annually.

“There's not a lot of money for kinds of things like this, so it's up to private people to help out when they can,” Leno told reporters in a press event ahead of the Purchase event. “It's a terrific organization and you don't really see the fruits of

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it until 20 or 30 years later when someone says, ‘I got to go to this college because of something you did or program you set up,’ so that's what makes you feel good.”

And perhaps that’s also the secret to Leno’s longevity — making people feel good. Unlike the present crop of late-night hosts who seem fixated on telling people how to vote, Leno would offer his “Tonight Show” viewers the opportunity to end their days with a laugh instead of a lecture. For more than two decades, there were few complaints from viewers — his ratings were nearly always ahead of rival David Letterman, whom he beat out as Johnny Carson’s “Tonight Show” successor. And if Leno had a negative comment about a politician or celebrity who was behaving badly, it would be the subject of a quick one-liner before zooming to another topic, not the focus of an entire monologue. Even today, Leno carefully balances political wisecracks on both sides of the aisle.

Indeed, Leno’s nice-guy attitude can play to his advantage when he occasionally sneaks in a very un-Leno remark. He drew both gasps and laughs at a recent show in Worcester, Massachusetts, when he dared to take on the region’s sports icons: “A liar, a cheater and a murderer walk into a bar. The bartender says, ‘Hey, the Patriots are in town.’”

More remarkable were Leno’s recent comments in another Hollywood Reporter piece published ahead of Letterman’s receiving the Mark Twain

Jay Leno. Photograph by Chris Yarzab / Creative Commons.

Prize. “The best days of my career were doing ‘Late Night With David Letterman,’” he recalls warmly, adding praise for his perceived foe in a self-deprecating manner. “I'm thrilled that Dave is getting the Mark Twain award. It's a great award. It's Mark Twain. And it gives my Mark Twain Prize credence.”

But whereas Letterman has returned from his late-night retirement in occasional (and, seemingly, cranky) appearances — he offered no tribute when Leno won his Mark Twain Prize in 2015 — Leno moved into a charming next chapter with “Jay Leno’s Garage,” a leisurely program on CNBC and YouTube that mixes his love for classic cars and invigorating conversation. And if that audience is smaller than his “Tonight” following, Leno is not

going to retreat into anxiety worrying about his legacy.

“Luckily, you as a performer don’t live on,” he told The New York Times earlier this year. “You die, eventually. If you’re worried about your legacy? Oh, shut up. Nobody cares. I was in Vegas and they were taking down an Elvis Presley exhibit at one of the hotels. I said, ‘What’s going on?’ They said, ‘We’re taking this down, the kids don’t really know who this is anymore.’ If you don’t know who Elvis is, I don’t think my legacy is something you have to worry about.”

For more on Leno, visit nbc.com/jay-lenos-garage and for more on Family Services of Westchester, visit fsw.org.

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Saluting ‘The Fellas’ in song

BY GREGG SHAPIRO

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FEW PEOPLE HAVE HAD THE KIND OF CAREER THAT THE GRACIOUS MELISSA MANCHESTER HAS HAD.

Melissa Manchester.

Photograph by Jennifer O. Hill.

From her early days singing at the Continental Baths in New York as one-third of Bette Midler’s backup vocal trio, The Harlettes, to a successful career as a singer/songwriter with hits ranging from “Midnight Blue” and “Don’t Cry Out Loud” to “Through the Eyes of Love” and “You Should Hear How She Talks About You” to acting in film, TV and onstage, Manchester is a powerhouse. Her latest project is “The Fellas” (Long Run Records), a fabulous and heartfelt tribute to celebrated crooners, including Mel Tormé, Nat King Cole, Frank Sinatra and Dean Martin.

What can you tell me about what would seem to be the daunting process of selecting songs by Nat King Cole, Dean Martin, Tony Bennett, Frank Sinatra, Mel Tormé and others to record for “The Fellas”?

“It was a bit daunting. Those guys lived in an age where their golden voices were catered to by songwriters of equal brilliance. I wanted to choose a song that would best capture the essence of them. They all had so many songs to choose from.

I suppose it’s my subjective point of view, but that made it a delightful challenge. I think I did well.”

I’m so glad you mentioned the songwriters. Like your 1989 album, “Tribute,” your new album pays homage to the singers who inspired you as a performer. As a songwriter, can you also say something about the influence of songwriters such as Jimmy Van Heusen, Sammy Cahn, Irving Berlin, Cole Porter, Michel Legrand and Marilyn and Alan Bergman? “’The Fellas’ is the completion of an idea that started in 1989 with ‘Tribute,’ which was obviously for the women that meant so much to me.

These artists predated the wave of singer/songwriters that showed up in the mid-’70s. In those days, these singers with these incredible voices were fortunate enough to have songwriters write for their voices. In my opinion, the songwriters were giants in their own right. That was also before the American popular song was rhythm-driven. They were still melody-driven. When they’re melody-driven, you have a chance to develop very long melody lines, which support long, developed lyrical ideas, giving the singer a lot to sing. If you have the strength and stamina of your voice to do that, then these songs are just magnificent to take charge of.”

One of the treats of the album is hearing you singing with Barry Manilow on “For

Me and My Gal.” How did this superb idea come about?

“Barry is an old friend. I reached out to him to create the only duet with me on the album. He agreed with me right away. He suggested a recreation of Gene Kelly and Judy Garland’s famous duet from the film of the same name. We basically stuck to Roger Edens’ original vocal arrangement.

It was great. Peter Hume did the orchestration.

“Barry came in to Citrus College (in Glendora, California, where she teaches) to look around and his mind was blown because musical education really saved his life. He so appreciated that a community college could have such a far and important reach with these kids. He thought that the state-of-the-art studio was fantastic. He loved the fact that the kids were making all kinds of musical noise in the hallway. It was wonderful. “ GS: Of “the fellas” to whom you pay tribute on the album, Johnny Mathis and Tony Bennett are the lone survivors. Do you know if they are aware of this musical project and, if so, what do they think of it?

“I reached out to both of them to see if they were interested in perhaps doing a duet. Johnny was making his own album. I never heard back from Tony Bennett’s camp, so I have no idea. Johnny has recorded a couple of my songs and I even got to perform with him on a PBS special. When the answer that you want doesn’t come back, you have to get peaceful and say, whether they know it or not, they are loved from afar and are being saluted. That’s all that’s important.”

In addition to “The Fellas,” the double disc set “Through The Eyes of Love: The Complete Arista 7" singles set has just been released. Do you have a favorite and least favorite Arista single?

“I don’t even remember all of the singles, so I can’t tell you what is my most or least favorite. The one that is most touching to me is ‘Midnight Blue,’ because it was my first single. What’s interesting about a lot of those songs is that they’re reflective of those musical times. They sound like the ’70s and ’80s. It’s a fantastic gift to have that collection.

They’re all remastered so they sound good. I was consulted on the liner notes, and it was lovely that both (CDs) came out on the same day.’

Finally, as one of Bette Midler’s former Harlettes, did you have a chance to see her do “Hello, Dolly!”?

“I haven’t seen her do “Hello, Dolly!” but I congratulated her right after she won the Tony. I’m so happy for her and proud of her.”

Melissa Manchester performs Feb. 17 in the Hillwood Recital Hall at Tilles Center for the Performing Arts in Greenvale, New York. For more, visit tillescenter.org.

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The nature of jewelry

BY MARY SHUSTACK

IT ALL BEGAN WITH A PAIR OF EARRINGS — GLIMMERING CZECH GLASS BUTTONS SET IN STATELY STERLING SILVER. THE PAIR ON DISPLAY AT THE LYNDHURST MUSEUM SHOP IN TARRYTOWN WAS SIMPLY CAPTIVATING. With the purchase, we received a bonus of sorts — learning the jewelry was the work of a local artist.

Fast forward a few months and here we are, visiting Amy Kahn Russell, the designer of those earrings, in her Ridgefield studio.

As Russell takes us on an informal tour through her art-filled space — a warren of offices, work stations and showroom-like areas, peppered with her paintings and stained-glass work — we are dazzled by the array of bracelets and rings, pendants and earrings on display, some complete, others in the midst of production.

But it’s Russell’s own story, one influenced by art, nature and extensive travel, that’s equally memorable.

EARLY DAYS Growing up in Louisiana, Russell would study painting, sculpture and lithography, earning a degree in fine arts from Tulane University in New Orleans.

But, she long had an affinity for jewelry.

“I always, as a kid, worked in a department store and my favorite department was always jewelry,” she says. “They’d put me in men’s clothing, and I’d say, ‘Can I go back to jewelry?’… I don’t want to sell sheets.”

Self-taught when it comes to jewelry, Russell would have some early jobs in the field after her formal art studies ended. She began a jewelry manufacturing business with two of her parents’ friends before moving to Houston, where she would run the fine jewelry department at a local branch of the Sakowitz department store chain. Knowledge gleaned from these jobs would expand when she relocated to Hong Kong for three years — thanks to her husband’s job — and there, she managed a wholesale pearl company.

“Things were very different,” she says. “People would go to the Orient to buy their pearls.”

The time, she says, not only expanded her horizons but also fueled her collecting habit.

“We got to travel extensively, to Pakistan, India, Thailand, Singapore,” she says. “We didn’t have kids and we knew what home looks like, so (we said) ‘We’re going to travel.’”

Clockwise, from opposite page, jewelry designer Amy Kahn Russell; a leopard painting, a Russian miniature, on black onyx with accent stones of peridot, quartz and rhutilated quartz set in sterling silver; and a necklace containing a handpainted Russian miniature of a dragonfly with carved turquoise and chrysoprase, citrine and peridot accents. All images courtesy Amy Kahn Russell.

HOME AGAIN Eventually, the Russells landed back in America, her husband’s job bringing them to the metro area.

She started her eponymous jewelry design company in Wilton, her home base for some 25 years as

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she and her husband raised two sons.

Though based in Ridgefield since 2007, Russell is often on the road, including travels some four times a year to Australia, where she’s a home-shopping network veteran with a devoted following.

Jewelry lovers appreciate her detail-oriented approach, whether it’s integrating collected stones and artifacts from decades of travel or commissioning cameo carvings from Italian master craftsmen or lacquer work from Russian artists.

Russell’s pieces — which are often crafted in sterling silver and sometimes 14-karat and 18-karat gold — feature mixed metals, natural minerals, pearls, fossils and semiprecious stones.

Just a simple chat or a glance through her designs yields elements such as blue topaz, Australian opal, Botswana agate, chalcedony, amethyst, freshwater pearls, garnet, chrysoprase, lapis lazuli, amazonite, aquamarine, labradorite, turquoise and peridot.

Her surroundings are a constant inspiration, “a treasure trove of color and texture,” she notes. “We pretty much have every color you can think of,” she says of the seemingly endless drawers and bags filled with materials.

“Believe it or not, it’s organized chaos.”

She does often start with sketches in her own studio area and might play with countless elements before deciding how to proceed.

“Sometimes you just have to make a mess, get it all out, to try it.”

THROUGH THE YEARS It’s no surprise that Russell’s creations have evolved over nearly 50 years of working with jewelry.

“When I first started, I was mostly antique and ethnic,” she says of her style. Back then, she adds, she surprised many a trunk-show customer expecting, “an older lady from the Southwest.”

“No,” she’d tell them, “I’m a short lady from Louisiana and 30 years old.”

Russell’s artistic eye has stayed the course. Typical is her exuberant approach, demonstrated as she takes a multistrand necklace that looks complete.

But, she notes, her work is designed to be “buildable.”

“For me, more is more, so I sometimes put a pendant on it, too,” she adds with a laugh.

But she does, it seems, have something for everyone.

Her new bar necklaces, for example, have proven a hit.

“A lot of the fine jewelry stores really embraced them,” she says, noting even the understated work still reflects her aesthetic. “You have this more demure piece, but it’s very organic, very natural.”

ART TO WEAR Russell, it’s clear, has the customer in mind at all times.

“Retail in America is changing, so you’re always finding your way,” she says.

She has been carried at major department stores such as Nordstrom and Saks Fifth Avenue, and to32

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Amy Kahn Russell designs include, from top, an “endless stones” bracelet containing Australian boulder opals with blue topaz, aquamarine, diamonds, apatite, iolite and diamonds in sterling; a bracelet made with hand-carved Brazilian drusy agate leaves accented with hessonite and topaz and garnet accented with white and yellow diamonds; and earrings featuring a cluster of gaspeite, chrysoprase, turquoise and faceted yellow topaz stones.

day, her work is featured in museum shops, art galleries, boutiques, catalogs and specialty stores, as well as through her own site.

As her audience continues to grow, Russell is dedicated to what’s worked best for her — no shortcuts.

“I go to the mines. I go to the cutters,” she says.

That yields not only unique materials but also an ability to price her work fairly.

“I like people to get good value… That’s why we make the jewelry so versatile, because you don’t feel the same every day,” she says. “You can be the designer of your outfit.”

For Russell, nothing is more rewarding than having someone enjoy — truly enjoy — her jewelry.

“I don’t like them to sit in the drawer,” she says.

So, does Russell make pieces just for herself?

“I do,” she says, breaking into a smile. Many are underway, though often they are never finished.

“It’s kind of like the shoemaker (who) goes barefoot.

I have all these projects…”

For more, visit amykahnrussell.com.

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Enter the dragon REBORN BY A WOMAN’S TOUCH

BY GEORGETTE GOUVEIA

THERE IS NO QUESTION THAT HOLLIE BONNEVILLE BARDEN IS A TRAILBLAZER. SHE WAS THE YOUNGEST CREATIVE DIRECTOR FOR DE BEERS, THE DIAMOND COMPANY AND, SINCE MAY OF LAST YEAR, THE FIRST FEMALE CREATIVE DIRECTOR FOR JOHN HARDY. THAT KIND OF SUCCESS REQUIRES A CERTAIN “TAKE THE BULL BY THE HORNS” ATTITUDE, AS BARDEN DESCRIBES HER OWN. BUT IT ALSO SUGGESTS A CERTAIN IMAGINATIVE EYE. We first met the graceful Barden a few weeks ago at a luncheon at Bloomingdale’s White Plains for aficionados of John Hardy, a peripatetic Canadian sculptor who found the beauty and craftsmanship he was seeking in Bali.

It was there in 1975 that he started an eponymous company, whose textured creations evoke the real and mythic fauna (dragons, cobras and eagles) and flora of the Hindu-centric Indonesian isle.

The pieces are made using the time-honored process of drawing and coloring the design, carving it in wax, casting it and then hand-setting it with gemstones. But the works are also crafted in an environment that takes a modern approach to community and sustainability.

The Ubud Design Studio and Workshop — which employs some 700 workers, with another 400 in Bangkok and 300 working at home — has a “Jobs for Life” program that guarantees a seamless labor supply from generation to generation. Craftsmen use only reclaimed gold and silver and ethically sourced gemstones. And for every purchase from the Bamboo Collection, a few seedlings are planted. (There have been more than one million planted to date as part of the “Wear Bamboo, Plant Bamboo” initiative.)

Perhaps no collection is more representative of Hardy’s work, however, than the Naga Collection, filled with protective, scaly, gem-eyed dragons, a creature beloved by the Balinese. Under Barden’s confident yet subtle direction, the Naga has become sleeker, more open, with tapered hinged settings.

The effect of a woman’s touch? We’ll let Barden explain:

Hollie Bonneville Barden in Bali.

Photographs courtesy John Hardy.

You’ve been described as a groundbreaker, but do you see yourself as such?

“I am very lucky to hold the title of creative director for such an iconic brand. It’s my personality to take the bull by the horns, which has helped me hold these very prestigious titles. Every day there is a steep learning curve, but it is empowering, too.

My background and experiences create a unique story that shapes me as a designer. Of course, people tend to be surprised by my age, but I have been fortunate to have incredible experiences thus far.”

You’ve talked about the beauty of Bali, the power of its animal imagery and the strength of women as playing a role in your designs.

How do these manifest themselves in the Hardy collections?

“The source of John Hardy jewelry is, ultimately, Bali — the mystery, nature, power and beauty of the island. In some ways, John Hardy jewelry is beyond jewelry, because it takes on so much emotional meaning for the person who wears it, combined with our customers' respect for John Hardy’s deep commitment to sustainability and age-old artistry.”

“Your designs for the Naga Collection are sleeker and more open than past Naga pieces.

To what extent do you think that being a woman influenced these and other design choices?

“My exploration of Naga was, in a way, a unique journey in discovering Bali. Through my creative process, I discovered that, beyond the Naga myth, Balinese folklore depicts the Naga as an embodiment of different natural spirits — the earth, the ocean and the sky, representing …raw, feminine beauty.”

which comes from a more global perspective. It is really powerful to be able to lean on the brand’s strong identity and history for inspiration and guidance.”

Describe your creative process for us.

“My design approach is enriched with concepts and refined in details. In the initial stages, I compile research and images and then begin sketching ideas until the spirit of a piece is defined and continue refining that until a perfect balance is achieved. John Hardy’s eight-step creation process is really in tune with my own process and results in pieces that are powerful, dramatic and inspiring.”

What Hardy pieces do you like to wear and when do you wear them?

“Each collection has such a unique appeal, it’s hard to choose favorites. I love the mythology and meaning behind Naga, as well as the drama and elegance of the coils. The Classic Chain collection is one of the most iconic, symbolizing the brand’s legendary ethos.”

You divide your life between Hardy headquarters in New York and the 400-acre complex in Bali. How does your life differ in each place?

“It is a dream to split my time between New York

Tell us a little bit about your background and how it led you to a life in jewelry design.

“I realized jewelry design could be a career for me in art school (Central Saint Martins in London) at the age of 18, thanks to an inspiring mentor who introduced me to (a jewelry) workshop.

The idea of bringing my ideas to life in three-dimensional form sparked my imagination and I fell in love with the symbolic allure and sentimental value of jewelry.”

You’ve lived and traveled all over the world. Does a global view inform your work as well?

“Of course, it is important to keep a brand’s heritage and identity in mind when designing, but it is equally important to inject your own personality and vision into each design, part of

The Legends Naga Kick Cuff in brushed 18-karat gold with diamonds, $12,000.

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and Bali. It is a true sort of yin and yang experience. In New York, I am attracted to the fast-paced rhythm of the city and all of the innovative design happening. In New York, I deal with the more business side of my job, while when I go to Bali, I usually focus on designing collections, meeting with the design team and our artisans and checking in on production. Bali offers a much slower pace but has an amazing creative energy.”

What do you see for the John Hardy Collections in the future?

“The exotic nature of John Hardy — its raw power — has not always been shown and I want to bring that to the forefront. I also love the story of how John Hardy himself first discovered Bali and wanted to imbue his jewelry with that same spirit. I want to take people who wear our jewelry on a journey.”

What do you see for yourself in the future?

“While my primary mission is to enhance and elevate the designs of John Hardy, I also hope to maintain its core Balinese spirit and heritage, with an emphasis on traditional craftsmanship and innovative thinking. I look forward to combining my artistic vision and luxury expertise with the brand’s powerful history.”

For more, visit johnhardy.com.

The Legends Naga Double Coil Bracelet in silver and 18-karat gold, $3,200.

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Josef Hoffmann (1870-1956), Centerpiece, 1924. Execution: Wiener Werkstätte. Brass.

Minneapolis Institute of Art.The Modernism Collection, gift of Norwest Bank Minnesota. All images courtesy Neue Galerie New York.

A true Viennese treat

BY MARY SHUSTACK

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DECEMBER 2017

Phillip Häusler (1887-1966), Table lamp, ca. 1919. Execution: Wiener Werkstätte. Brass; textile, beads. Museum of Fine Arts, Boston. Gift of the Margaret K. Koerner and Joseph Leo Koerner family.

Josef Hoffmann (1870-1956), Teapot, 1904. Execution: Wiener Werkstätte. Silver; ebony, raffia. Museum of Fine Arts, Boston. Edwin E. Jack Fund, John H. and Ernestine A. Payne Fund, and Helen and Alice Colburn Fund.

THERE’S A RENEWED APPRECIATION FOR SUPERIOR CRAFTSMANSHIP, AN EVER-GROWING CELEBRATION OF BOTH “THE MAKER” AND HIS OR HER WORK.

For evidence, look no further than the artists and artisans featured at the wealth of holiday markets offered throughout the region.

And then, there’s the popularity of recent exhibitions devoted to the enduring artistry and craftsmanship of legacy brands. Shows this year have already recognized Patek Philippe, Cartier and Van Cleef & Arpels, with a Louis Vuitton exhibition now underway.

So, it seems a case of perfect timing, then, for Neue Galerie New York to train a spotlight on the Wiener Werkstätte, or Vienna Workshops.

In “Wiener Werkstätte 1903-1932: The Luxury of Beauty,” the museum devoted to German and Austrian art offers a dazzling tour through the progressive collective of artists and craftsmen who lived in the Austrian capital in the early 20th century.

In introducing the show, Renée Price, director of Neue Galerie New York, writes, “The Wiener Werkstätte began as a movement to champion

the role of the craftsperson alongside that of the artist and patron and to elevate the quality of goods produced.”

From ceramics to fashion, furniture to jewelry, textiles to wallpaper and so much more, the works today stand as vivid testament to a singular goal.

“All these diverse forms were expressions of a single intention, one that is very dear to us at the Neue Galerie New York — the beautification of everyday life,” Price adds.

The sweeping decorative-arts show, designed as a major retrospective of the collective founded by Josef Hoffmann, Koloman Moser and Fritz Waerndorfer, has drawn together some 450 objects, with loans representing public and private collections in the United States and Europe. Visitors will delight in the whimsy of a bird-shaped candy box or the intricacy of a semiprecious stone-ornamented brooch, the sleek lines of a deceptively straightforward armchair or the simple beauty of a streamlined teapot.

The exhibition features a true depth in jewelry and furniture, ceramics and graphic design, home goods and drawings, paintings and ceramics, fashions and textiles, showcasing the collective’s aesthetic and spotlighting its leading lights, including Hoffmann, Moser and Dagobert Peche, all featured through iconic examples.

It’s an immersive exhibition, aided by period wall treatments and other evocative details that carry visitors through the museum’s third floor

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Clockwise from above left, Dagobert Peche (1887-1923), Bird-shaped candy box, 1920. Execution: Wiener Werkstätte. Silver; coral.

Neue Galerie New York; Josef Hoffmann (1870-1956), Tobacco case for Otto Primavesi, 1912. Execution: Wiener Werkstätte. Gold; lapis lazuli, pearl, turquoise, coral, opal, carnelian and other semi-precious stones. Private Collection; and Josef Hoffmann (18701956), Brooch acquired by Fritz Waerndorfer for Lili Waerndorfer, 1904. Execution: Wiener Werkstätte. Silver, partial gilt; diamond, moonstone, opal, lapis lazuli, coral, leopardite. Neue Galerie New York.

and its chapters, “Founding Years, 1903-05,” “Harvesting Years, 1906-14” and “Years of Reinvention, 1915-32.” A “concluding” room, an inviting space with a vibrant pink hue, explores the Wiener Werkstätte of America, on Fifth Avenue in New York, as well as Austrian-American architect, illustrator and scenic designer Joseph Urban’s involvement with William Randolph Hearst’s Cosmopolitan Productions, depicted through photographs, movie stills and set designs. In addition, the second-floor galleries have been borrowed to showcase major pieces of furniture, works on paper and decorative objects, along with their design drawings.

The show is curated by Christian Witt-Dörring, curator of decorative arts for Neue Galerie New York, with Janis Staggs, Neue's director for curatorial and manager of publications, the co-curator for the exhibition. They have also teamed up to edit the impressively comprehensive companion catalog published by Prestel, a hefty 400-page hardcover book. It’s a worthy reference that’s priced at a most attractive $65, with every purchase supporting the Neue Galerie.

“Wiener Werkstätte 1903-1932: The Luxury of Beauty” continues through Jan. 29 at the Neue Galerie New York, at 1048 Fifth Ave. in Manhattan. For more, visit neuegalerie.org.

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A most fabulous footprint

BY DANIELLE RENDA

THERE ARE SO MANY PLACES TO GO, BUT NEVER ENOUGH LUGGAGE SPACE FOR SHOES. It was a dilemma that entrepreneurs Catherine Levene and Deb Perkins were all too familiar with — and frustrated by.

And one, they soon learned, they shared with supermodel Carol Alt. The friends — Levene, a native New Yorker, and Perkins, who lived in Fairfield for 28 years before moving to Manhattan two years ago — met in Madrid, bonding over their love of food, travel and fashion, namely shoes. Though in addition to their similar taste in footwear, these on-the-go gals shared a major distaste — for their large shoe collections, the heavy, oversized baggage that carried them and their tired feet, which painfully distracted from the beautiful cities they visited.

Weary of their shoe situation, the ladies created a solution in the form of Cat Perkins, a travel-friendly accessories company — with a little help from Alt. The online store, which opened in 2013, offers a selection of products that boast convenience, from the likes of portfolio and passport cases to luggage tags. But the company is best-known for its transformable shoes, which allow the wearer to mix and match tops with bottoms for multiple looks requiring minimal storage space.

“There were many things about this shoe that I liked,” says Alt, who attended the opening of Cat Perkins’ first pop-up store, which continues in Westport through Dec. 31. “To be able to travel

with this in your suitcase, you can bring 10 or 20 pairs of shoes in the width of like 8 inches.”

Alt knows the deal when it comes to fashion.

Despite her local roots — she was born in Flushing, Queens — she spent her career traveling the world as a model and actress, having graced hundreds of magazine covers, including those of Harper’s Bazaar, Sports Illustrated, Vogue, Elle and Cosmopolitan. Still in the limelight today, she is the host of “A Healthy You and Carol Alt,” a 30-minute, weekly wellness series on Fox News Channel and has, thus far, authored four books.

She knows an active lifestyle demands a shoe that’s made for walking — though in the most stylish way possible. So when Alt heard about Cat Perkins through a friend, she was immediately intrigued. How was it possible that her friend — who appeared to be changing shoes throughout the day — traveled with a single small suitcase? And when Alt was informed of these travel-friendly shoes, she decided to cold call the company, posing a simply question: “What can I do to help?”

“It’s my way of giving back,” she says, speaking about her appreciation for entrepreneurial endeavors, especially those that are women-owned.

Delighted to hear from Alt, the owners welcomed her on board the creative team.

A lot of thought went into the production process, Alt explains. Levene and Perkins didn’t want to sacrifice function for fashion, or vice versa. It was this determination that led to the patent for (and perfection of) a fastener that would allow wearers to change the upper part of their shoes — in less than 20 seconds — for entirely different

A selection of Cat Perkins’ “transformable” wedges, soon to be joined by a collection of boots, heels and flats. Photograph by Danielle Renda.

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looks at a moment’s notice. Instead of packing 10 pairs of shoes for a trip, wearers could pack one or two bottoms with many tops, which is far more travel-friendly.

“We both realized that we wanted higher heels and we both wanted to travel with less, because our shoes were so bulky,” Levene says. “We also both have running injuries, so we wound up creating a line of shoes that are fashionable, wearable and functional.”

The company offers 4 1/4-inch wedge bottoms in cork, stack or wood, with color options, including black, gray, natural and Oakwood. Uppers, which are secured onto the shoe using a rivet mechanism, are available in leather or suede styles that include fringe, snakeskin or monochromatic in a range of colors, with new options introduced throughout the year. According to the owners, boots, heels and flats are also in the works.

Wearing a feminine white bohemian dress that beautifully contrasted with her blue suede wedges, Alt spoke of her experience with the shoes. She broke down the convenience factor, explaining that by purchasing three tops and two bottoms, you have six pairs to choose from.

“The thing that I didn’t like about fashion was that it was super expensive for the fads and then, Harlem Choir WAG HP 2.pdf 10 the next year it wasGospel finished.

That really bothered

Supermodel Carol Alt, a member of Cat Perkins’ creative team, joined the opening of the Westport pop-up store.

Photograph courtesy Cat Perkins.

me, because sometimes I would find a shoe that I liked and I wanted to wear it for longer,” she says.

“With these shoes, you can upgrade the tops every year and keep the bottom, because it’s a perennial bottom.”

But style isn’t necessarily the most luxurious part of the shoe. With a 5-millimeter, crush-resistant, memory foam, athletic footbed, it boasts round-theclock comfort. The design of the shoe assures the wearer’s weight is equally distributed throughout, 11/10/2017 rather than4:45:04 placingPM excess pressure on the balls of

the feet, which can become quite painful.

“I can stand forever in this shoe,” Alt says.

Levene and Perkins have also taken their production process a step further by extending a hand (or a foot) to women in need. The owners selected a private, Brooklyn-based factory as their site of manufacturing, which is female-owned and employs women who have been affected by sex trafficking.

“It’s women helping women helping women,” Alt adds.

As a way to connect with the community, the Westport pop-up store will also be spotlighting one to two charities per week that focus on women. The store plans to host events, such as cocktail parties and shopping experiences, of which a percentage of the proceeds will be donated to the charities.

“It’s part of a platform we’re doing called, ‘What You Stand On is as Important as What You Stand For,’” Levene says.

With a set of powerful women standing (comfortably) behind Cat Perkins, the brand is bound to leave an imprint — and we’re not just talking about a footprint.

Cat Perkins is at 136 Main St. in Westport. For more, visit catperkins.com. And for more about Carol Alt, visit carolalt.com.

A Joyful Gospel Concert for the Holidays PERFORMING CONTEMPORARY GOSPEL WITH A TOUCH OF JAZZ AND BLUES PRESENT

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TICKETS: IVESCONCERTPARK.COM OR CALL 203.837.8732

The Gift of Caregiver Relief this Winter.

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anaging a loved one’s healthcare can be taxing and all-consuming, which is why it’s so important for caregivers to take the time to rest, relax and rejuvenate. Waveny’s caregiver relief solutions can help seniors and families receive the services they need to make the most of this winter, together.

During the week, take advantage of our vibrant Adult Day Program with free local transportation for daytime peace of mind. Or, plan a getaway knowing overnight respite guests with Alzheimer’s and dementia can stay with us for as short as a week at The Village, our award-winning Assisted Living community. Our trusted care can even come to you – whether personalized assistance or just a helping hand – through Waveny’s home-based services. Or, choose any combination of our services and programs to meet your unique needs and preferences.

Conveniently located in New Canaan, Waveny’s continuum of care flows fluidly within a single nonprofit organization, without any expensive buy-in fees or long-term commitments.

So if downsizing into a caring and compassionate independent or assisted living community is something you’re considering, winter is the perfect time to take advantage of a 3-month trial at either The Inn or The Village.

Discover more by dropping by, calling 203.594.5302 or visiting waveny.org.

Lidia Bastianich serves up a bountiful buffet in her new cookbook.

Ambassador of Italian cuisine

BY GINA GOUVEIA

“WHY DO I KEEP WRITING COOKBOOKS?,” LIDIA BASTIANICH ASKED THE AUDIENCE OF MORE THAN 400 AT A RECENT BOOK SIGNING AT BARNES & NOBLE EASTCHESTER. “BECAUSE YOU HAVE QUESTIONS.” And in turn, she cheerfully fielded several from her devoted fan base gathered for the release of her 11th cookbook, “Lidia’s Celebrate Like an Italian” (Alfred A. Knopf, $35, 383 pages). This is the seventh book she has co-authored with her daughter, Tanya Bastianich Manuali, and only partly representative of the massive culinary empire Lidia has been building since 1971.

Now she admits to slowing down, feeling the wear and tear of 40 years on her feet as a chef, so she is cutting back a bit on her schedule. Still this has not deterred her from the current rigorous book tour or her many other responsibilities. You see, Lidia is also the proprietor of the original Felidia’s, now with locations in Kansas City, Missouri, and Pittsburgh, and Becca, Esca and Del Posto, all in Manhattan. She appears regularly on the Emmy-winning series “Lidia Celebrates America”

and “Lidia’s Italy,” broadcast on public television, and partners with son Joseph Bastianich, Mario Batali and Oscar Farinetti in Eataly, the successful food and wine marketplaces, now with seven locations in the Western Hemisphere. Under this ever-expanding umbrella of businesses, there’s a line of tableware and cookware sold on QVC and a line of sauces and pastas, LIDIA’s, both co-ventures with daughter Tanya and son-in-law Corrado. Two award-winning wineries in Italy produce wines under her own label and are overseen by her son.

To spend time with Lidia, as I did in our oneon-one prior to the book signing, is to be instantly charmed by her warmth, enthusiasm and Italian charisma. She tells me that she’s just left her 97-year old mother, Erminia, at home in Queens, the family’s base since they immigrated to the States in the late 1950s when Lidia was 12. She is a native of Pula, Istria — once part of Italy, now Croatia — which was disrupted in a geopolitical upset after World War II. Following a brief period as refugees in Trieste, the family was sponsored by a Catholic relief organization to come to the U.S. For Lidia, as she tells it, “It was always about food.” Her early childhood years may have been spent cooking at her grandmother’s side and tending to the chickens and goats, but once in America, Lidia found herself under the tutelage of nuns, peeling potatoes in a convent for a stipend. By 14 she was working the counter at Walken’s Bakery in Astoria (yes, as in Christopher Walken, the actor whose family owned and operated the bakery, and, by the way, they are still friends). “There I was, delivering wedding cakes with him.”

So, there’s lots of color and interesting stories, tales of the two original restaurants in Astoria as a young bride with her husband, Felice, from whom

she divorced in the 1990s. It was the sale of those two establishments that enabled the purchase of the elegant townhouse on East 58th Street, home to the original Felidia since 1981.

Is there ever time for the family to sit down together for dinner? Almost every weekend, she tells me happily. "I'll make a big pot of soup for my mother, dishes that will last her through the week."

Also on the menu are the ones her grandchildren request time and time again — tortellini in brodo, roasted chicken with potatoes, baked pasta and, on special occasions, her signature homemade gnocchi. Lidia's favorite go-to dish — simple linguine with garlic and oil, made with good quality imported dry pasta. Out of respect for her colleagues, on her nights out she’ll frequent other Italian restaurants, but given the choice, she’ll opt for one of her other loves, sushi, Thai or Chinese food.

Lidia is here to talk about her book, but I want more of her backstory. What was it like being a female chef and restaurateur in the ’80s in New York City? Groundbreaking — my word. Lidia humbly speaks of her success, attributing it to word of mouth, the quality of ingredients — she can't stress this enough — and creating dishes that were representative of regional Italian cuisine, not "your typical Italian-American experience," as she puts it. At the time, new on the Manhattan restaurant scene, there was lots of buzz about her place. Big name chefs of the day would come by Felidia’s — James Beard and Julia Child, who wanted Lidia to teach her how to make risotto. Lidia credits Child’s producer with helping her achieve her own series on public television. She may have cooked for two popes — Benedict XVI and Francis — during her career, but modesty is a virtue Lidia employs skillfully. She gained more and more attention but not ac-

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ceptance from the “French toque'd chefs who wore their stiff white hats and looked down their noses at me. Yet, they would come to talk and drink and eat my food,” she says. This inspired her to travel back and forth to Italy, honing her skills with the masters there and building strong relationships with her peers.

What about reviews? Everyone's a food critic on social media platforms today. I ask her if she pays much attention. To a degree, she admits. She is interested to know what the public thinks because she still learns from criticism and makes improvements. Del Posto Restaurant in the meatpacking district of Manhattan — recently awarded a Michelin star for the fourth time — has just promoted a female chef who worked her way up the ranks for the past six years, to be its executive chef. Lidia’s advice for the female chefs of today? "Don’t define yourself by your gender, define yourself by your accomplishments. Let the quality of your food speak for who you are and you will succeed."

Lidia acknowledges her good fortune, “I was blessed,” she tells me, and so she generously shares her time in the service of others, working with two nonprofit organizations of women leaders in food and hospitality and serving on the board of Arrupe

Classic Italian Wedding Soup with crusty bread and Grana Padano. Photographs by Steve Giralt.

College, a program of Loyola University Chicago supporting underprivileged students. She also participates actively in countless special events on behalf of several foundations and PBS. But tonight she is focused on promoting her latest cookbook, a compilation of tried-and-true recipes from the past and some new ones, as the subtitle suggests — “220 Foolproof Recipes That

Westchester Philharmonic

Winter Pops!

Make Every Meal a Party.” Her intent, particularly with this one, is to enter our homes and join our celebrations as we recreate her recipes. It includes well-crafted plans for executing everyday family meals, dinner parties and even an Italian wedding.

All you need, she tells the crowd, is a nice baked pasta as the mid-course following a traditional antipasti and finished off with a big roast and you have an Italian feast.

Next, don't forget about the beverages and, if you're hosting a dinner party, don't stress having every brand of alcohol you think your guests like to drink, just have one specialty cocktail: There are more than 20 in her book. She strongly encourages the use of fresh, quality ingredients, displayed appropriately with a back-up in the fridge, all ready for the guests to create their own. Of course, always have red and white wines on hand, and nonalcoholic choices such as sparkling water with fresh garnishes.

To receive advice from Lidia — especially in person, but also from her cookbooks — is to gain bits of wisdom from a master who knows her way around a kitchen, the grandmother you wish were cooking dinner for you every day, as mine did for me when I was a child.

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A FUTURE FOR THE AUTISTIC

BY JENA A. BUTTERFIELD

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hat will happen when I die?”

It’s a gut-wrenching question many of us ask. But for those seated in a darkened theater at Greenwich Country Day School recently, the yearning for an answer was palpable and more altruistic than existential.

The audience — mostly parents and loved ones of someone on the autism spectrum — had gathered for a screening of the HBO documentary film “How to Dance in Ohio,” a poignant chronicle of three autistic young women who spent three months in group therapy preparing for a spring formal dance.

The prom, a coming of age tradition, was the brainchild of clinical psychologist Emilio Amigo as part of an innovative social skills therapy program in Columbus, Ohio.

“You need talented people,” David Remnick, editor of The New Yorker magazine, said in an interview with WAG at the event. He and wife Esther Fein, a former journalist with The New York Times, are the parents of three adult children, including an 18-year-old autistic daughter, Natasha.

She is among the more than half a million teens with autism who, over the coming de-

NEXT for AUTISM board member David Remnick.

Images courtesy Josh Wong Photography.

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cade, will fall off what experts warningly deem “The Cliff,” when young adults turn 21 and age out of a funded system of services. According to Autism Speaks, a nonprofit advocacy group, almost half of 25-year-olds with Autism Spectrum Disorder (ASD) have never held a job and 84 percent live with aging parents. What happens to autistic children when they become autistic adults?

In “How to Dance in Ohio,” filmmaker Alexandra Shiva captures one man’s answer as Amigo guides a group of autistic young adults through the social challenges of the prom in a way that left one woman in the audience dabbing at tears as the credits rolled. Programs like the one depicted in the film demonstrate that limitations can be breached and ambitions left intact. The screening drove home the need for organizations that fill a void.

Organizations like NEXT for AUTISM, which sponsored the event and numbers Remnick and Fein as board members. The nonprofit strives to improve the lives of people living with ASD in a tangible way. It opened the first evidence-based public school for autistic children in New York State (in Harlem) and a second recently in the Bronx.

NEXT also developed The Center for Autism and the Developing Brain (CADB) at New York-Presbyterian Hospital, Columbia and Weill Cornell.

Fein says it is her and Remnick’s mission to help support organizations like NEXT that provide concrete solutions now, so important for those nearing or past “The Cliff.”

In so doing, they carve a path for their daughter to live with meaning, engagement and as independently as possible, enjoying the things she loves most, like the outdoors and the bustling city.

They want other families to have the same peace of mind.

“We have to get from Monday to Tuesday to Wednesday,” Remnick said. “There’s a realism to it.”

After the screening, Remnick took the stage to moderate a panel that included Shiva; Christine Lai, a NEXT board member; Liane Kupferberg Carter, a writer and journalist who’s an autism advocate; and Jerry Philip, NEXT’s vice president of program development. Philip heads an employment program at NEXT that takes

students into immersive work environments on three 10-week rotations. The students are assisted by a team that helps them transition into jobs and learn the different culture of work, which requires a flexibility and a reading of social cues that may not be in the autistic person’s skill set.

NEXT Co-founder and President Ilene Lainer — the mother of two adult sons, one of whom is autistic — spoke about advocating for all families touched by ASD. She said she understands the highs and lows articulated both in the film and on the panel. Every family has a unique struggle.

“The worst part for me was the loneliness,” panelist Carter said about the internal world of her son. Remnick asked whether she meant “his loneliness or yours?” “Both,” she said.

In response to a woman in the audience who was frustrated that television shows and films don’t present the severe end of the spectrum, Remnick reacted with a perspective he’s arrived at after 18 years of evolving opinion.

“I have a daughter who has very minimal language,” he said. “To get mad seems off and wrong.

HE ACKNOWLEDGED THAT THE FIRST TIME HE SAW 'RAIN MAN' (THE 1988 FILM IN WHICH DUSTIN HOFFMAN PORTRAYED AN AUTISTIC SAVANT), HE WAS INITIALLY INFURIATED. NOT EVERYONE HAS A SPECIAL TALENT OR IS A SAVANT AT MATH. ACCORDING TO THE CENTERS FOR DISEASE CONTROL AND PREVENTION, ABOUT 44 PERCENT OF AUTISTIC CHILDREN HAVE AVERAGE TO ABOVE AVERAGE INTELLECTUAL ABILITY AND ABOUT A THIRD HAVE AN INTELLECTUAL DISABILITY.

Life is too short. Nobody is exactly the same.”

He acknowledged that the first time he saw “Rain Man” (the 1988 film in which Dustin Hoffman portrayed an autistic savant), he was initially infuriated. Not everyone has a special talent or is a savant at math. According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, about 44 percent of autistic children have average to above average intellectual ability and about a third have an intellectual disability.

The spectrum is wide. But if the public gains a greater understanding by seeing different manifestations depicted on film, everyone benefits.

Eventually, a picture of an integrated future starts to form. Lainer likened the process to that of watching a Polaroid picture develop. At first, the image is blurry. Then shapes emerge and sharpen. It takes more time for the proper colors to appear.

It was almost 10 p.m. in Greenwich and the auditorium bustled with pioneers in adult autism swapping cards, networking and doing what’s necessary for those they love — all of them working toward color.

For more, visit nextforautism.org.

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NOW PITCHING FOR PHELPS HOSPITAL

W

hether he’s starring on its softball team, delivering newspapers to its patients or touring children around its floors, Jim Goldsmith is always in there pitching for Phelps Memorial Hospital in Sleepy Hollow. And, as he says, “I wouldn’t trade my last 18 years working for Phelps for anything. The time I have spent with my ‘hands-on’ volunteer activities has given me a real insight into the hospital and the patients it helps to get well.”

As a board member, Goldsmith performs all of

BEFORE PHELPS A New York City native, Goldsmith graduated with an A.B. degree from Brown University in 1957 and started a career in textile sales that was quickly interrupted when he was drafted into the U.S. Army. After working in counterintelligence for two and a half years, he moved back to New York City and began work at Macy’s.

“I was a clown in the Macy’s Thanksgiving Day Parade and later served as a celebrity host. I really enjoyed the fun and excitement of the day and the interaction with the participants and the crowds.

The most important thing is to stay with your float.”

After Macy’s, Goldsmith went to Burlington Industries, working in several different sales divisions over 35 years and eventually becoming sales manager for the company, the largest public textile company in America.

“I retired from Burlington 18 years ago at the age of 63,” he said.

“The minute you retire, people ask you what you are going to do. Not being busy is a hard thing to get used to.”

BY JANE K. DOVE

Jim Goldsmith. Photograph by Sebastián Flores.

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the duties pertinent to that role with close attention and due diligence, but it is his “second volunteer hat,” that makes him shine in the eyes of the hospital community, which honored him at the Phelps 30th anniversary Champagne Ball last month at the Sleepy Hollow Country Club.

“Nothing makes me happier than to finish my boardroom duties and be a hands-on volunteer, mingling with patients and staff in a variety of different ways,” he says. “I took to the role from the day I first went to the Phelps volunteer office and asked what I could do to help. I started on Ladies Day as a volunteer for the Phelps Auxiliary and eventually became a member of the board.”

SIGNING UP Goldsmith had had some wonderful experiences with Phelps, so it was natural for him to think of the hospital in terms of doing some sort of volunteer work.

“I was living in Briarcliff Manor at

the time and they wanted someone from that area, although I convinced myself it was really because of my charm and charisma. I signed up as a volunteer for the auxiliary board and did whatever was needed — working in the gift shop, running bake sales and other small fundraisers and whatever else I was called upon to do.”

Ultimately, Goldsmith became president of the auxiliary, which gained him an automatic seat on Phelps’ board of directors. “The board makes decisions on how to better improve the hospital and its services,” he says. “We have a number of different committees that all work very well together for the good of the hospital and the patients we serve.”

After two four-year terms on the auxiliary, Goldsmith has served on the hospital’s board for nine years and was selected to be the board’s secretary.

But it is the hands-on, day-to-day life of the hospital that keeps Goldsmith energized and enthusiastic to the point where he devotes as many as 50 hours per month to different tasks.

“Any able-bodied individual who steps up to volunteer at Phelps starts out in patient transportation and so did I,” he says. “While doing this I noticed the volunteer who delivered and sold

newspapers so I asked to be switched to that job and got it.”

Phelps says he enjoyed his daily interactions tremendously as “newspaper boy.”

Patients have to pay for the paper and this sometimes involves negotiations and discussions if cash is not on hand. “You’d be surprised at the issues surrounding payment for the newspaper,” he says.

“But I enjoy it and often simply pay for the paper myself if things get touchy.”

Another hands-on activity Goldsmith enjoys tremendously is taking adults and children on tours of the hospital.

“I take about 22 at a time, mostly kids, on Tuesdays, Wednesdays and Thursdays. I show them many different parts of the hospital and its equipment, including the MRI center; the surgery center, when not in use, of course; a mock-up of one of our ambulances; the out-patient rehabilitation center; rehabilitation pool; kitchen and food locker; hyperbaric chamber; a peek into the emergency room; and a look at our X-Ray and CAT scan machines.

The kids are always fascinated and I make sure they do not see anything that might upset them.”

In addition to distinguishing himself as a handson volunteer in the hospital itself, Goldsmith is also a standout in the co-ed softball league organized

by Northwell, the parent network of Phelps and Northern Westchester Hospital.

“The two hospitals have faced off in several games, with me pitching for Phelps,” Goldsmith says. “We haven’t beaten Northern Westchester yet, but we’re working on it.”

A DIFFERENT PERSPECTIVE Goldsmith — who lives in Ossining with wife Donna — says his volunteer work at Phelps has made him a much more effective board member.

“You can’t learn much about the reality of the hospital setting at the table in the boardroom, but you get a feel for what is really happening when you get out into the patient and service areas. People talk and, if you listen, you can find a lot out. I believe it’s very important to be hands-on.”

Goldsmith says he usually spends two hours a day, six days a week doing that kind of volunteer work at Phelps. “Then I have the regular board and committee meetings. I would estimate I usually log in 52 to 54 hours a month when it’s all added up.

“I love both of my Phelps ‘hats’ and wouldn’t trade one for the other. I believe being an effective volunteer requires both.”

For more, visit phelpshospital.org.

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IMPERIAL TREATMENT FOR AN AMERICAN PRESIDENT

BY AUDREY RONNING TOPPING

Presidents Xi Jingping and Donald J. Trump greet children during Trump’s recent state visit to China.

WHEN PRESIDENT DONALD J. TRUMP AND WIFE MELANIA LANDED IN BEIJING, CHINA ON NOV. 8, THEY WERE WELCOMED BY ALL THE POMP AND CEREMONY A STATE VISIT PLUS HAS TO OFFER. IN OTHER WORDS, THEY GOT THE EMPEROR’S TREATMENT LIKE NO OTHER FOREIGN HEAD OF STATE HAS HAD THERE SINCE THE COMMUNISTS TOOK POWER IN 1949.

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To the delight of Trump, the extravagant airport welcome ceremony upstaged the receptions for both Presidents Bill Clinton and Barack Obama and was even more elaborate than Mao Zedong’s welcome to President Richard Nixon in 1972. Trump’s CEO entourage — including the chiefs of influential American companies like Boeing, Westinghouse Electric and Goldman Sachs, all hoping to make deals — were ushered into a caravan of black stretch limousines. En route to Beijing, the heavily escorted convoy was hailed along the road by tens of thousands of citizens and colorfully dressed children who had been organized into a “spontaneous demonstration,” waving Chinese and American flags, instead of the hail of Mao’s “Little Red Book” that had greeted Nixon and Henry Kissinger.

In Tiananmen Square, a smart, red-coated military band was waiting to play the national anthems of both countries while Trump, hand on heart, and Xi stood solemnly side-by-side beneath a gold-trimmed pavilion. Melania Trump, in a long Chinese-style cheongsam intricately embroidered with symbolic white peonies, China’s national flower, contrasted sharply with Xi’s wife, Peng Liyuan, a well-known singer there, in a short, black American style coat as they stood before The Great Hall of People to watch, with the rest of the world, the two most powerful men in the world parade around the red-carpeted square to review China’s Army, Navy and Air Force troops ablaze in full regalia.

They later marched past the presidents in a syn-

chronized high-step precision that would’ve been the envy of the Rockettes.

After more pageantry in the Great Hall, the two presidents sat down to flatter each other. Trump spoke of Xi as a friend with whom he had “great chemistry.” He marveled at the hospitality Xi had shown him, including the elaborate military parade about which he said “nothing you can see is so beautiful.”

Xi listened with a rapt smile as Trump said, “I look forward to many years of friendship, working together to solve not only our problems but world problems.” Xi replied: “China and U.S.A. relationship now stands at a new starting point.”

Trump later gushed to Lou Dobbs on the Fox Business Network that “Now some people might call him the king of China….I happen to think he is a very good person.”

Trump’s visit was the first state visit since the 19th Party Congress endorsed Xi’s power last October, making him the unquestioned paramount leader of China and effectively elevating him to a Mao-like status for life. The pomp gave Xi a chance to showcase his “China Dream” — a vision of his nation joining or perhaps supplanting the United States as a superpower leading the world. Xi out-

lined his plans to make China “a global leader in terms of comprehensive national strength and international influence” by 2050. Like most Chinese leaders, Xi tends to think long-term in contrast to Trump, who seems to have a short-term focus, concentrating on daily news issues.

The grand pageantry in Tiananmen Square was crowned by a lavish banquet for the Trumps held in the dining hall of the ancient emperor’s private palace in the Forbidden City where no one had dared to dine since it was sealed shut after the fall of the Manchu Qing Dynasty in 1912. Then, as a special treat, the rather jet-lagged Trump party attended a traditional Chinese opera plus acrobats held in the Imperial Palace theater once enjoyed by the Ming and Qing royal courts.

Bloomberg Businessweek wondered if the art of the deal worked on Xi, who wants a special relationship that would confirm co-superpower status for China. There was a deal of sorts jointly announced on Nov. 9 by Trump and Xi: $250 billion in commercial sales and two-way investment agreements involving U.S. and Chinese entities. Some of the details will require more negotiation.

Nevertheless, during the state visit, a gracious time seemed to be had by all.

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ICY PLUNGE FOR A HOT CAUSE

BY RYAN DEFFENBAUGH Pat Quinn. Courtesy Quinn for the Win.

E

Every August until a cure.

It has been two-and-a-half years since Pat Quinn delivered those words in an acceptance speech for special achievement at the Webby Awards. The phrase became a rallying cry for people living with ALS and their families.

Quinn, now 34, was there in recognition of his efforts in co-founding the Ice Bucket Challenge, considered among the most successful online fundraising campaigns of all time.

This past August marked the three-year anniversary of the Ice Bucket Challenge, which Quinn co-founded with Pete Frates, who was diagnosed with ALS at age 27 in 2012. A year later, Quinn, then 30 also received a diagnosis of this incurable motor-neuron disease, formally known as amyotrophic lateral sclerosis but better known as Lou Gehrig’s Disease for the legendary New York Yankee who died of it in 1941 at age 37.

During a November interview in Quinn’s Yonkers apartment overlooking the Hudson River, he repeats those five words about a cure when

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asked about the future of the Ice Bucket Challenge, in which participants douse themselves (or are doused) with a bucket of ice water to promote awareness of the disease and financial support for a cure in the form of charitable fines for not accepting the challenge within 24 hours.

“While it will never again be what it was that first summer, it's important to keep it going so people know that it's not over,” he said. “Until people can live with ALS, and are not just dying from it, we won't stop.”

While Quinn can still communicate using his own voice, and does so while speaking with WAG, he requires a quiet setting to be heard. Soon he said he will rely more on a speech-generating device, which allows him to type out words with his eyes.

ALS, which attacks the nerve cells in the brain and spinal cord, has no known cure and only one FDA-approved drug that can modestly extend survival. The disease causes people to lose the ability to control muscle movement, leading to paralysis and death typically within two to five years of diagnosis.

About 6,000 people are diagnosed every year.

The disease has taken much of the strength from Quinn’s legs and arms, leaving him unable to walk and with only slight movement in his fingers and shoulders.

But Quinn says he’s as determined as ever to push for ALS awareness and a cure.

He grew up in Yonkers, attending Iona Prep for high school and then Iona College, where he played rugby. After his diagnosis at age 30, Quinn said he spent about a week adjusting to the new reality before resolving he would “get involved and make a difference.”

“I knew I was young and my progression wasn’t too fast, so I knew I had time to create awareness.”

Quinn said his own awareness of ALS was limited before he was diagnosed.

“I knew a little,” Quinn said. “I knew Lou Gehrig.

I knew it was not good. But I had no idea how devastating it can be.”

He spent the first year after his diagnosis putting himself out there, telling his story and connecting with people also living with ALS. He entered a team of 200 friends and family into the Westchester Walk to Defeat ALS at Manhattanville College that year.

“After the walk, I knew we had something special,” Quinn said.

But did he ever expect to launch a worldwide movement? Quinn smiles when asked about that first summer in 2014 with the Ice Bucket Challenge.

“When we saw the Ice Bucket, we saw an opportunity to create awareness, but then it took on a life of its own” he said.

The Ice Bucket Challenge had been around about a year before it came to Quinn’s attention. It

had been mostly used to raise awareness for a mix of causes.

The rules were simple and perfectly designed to expand rapidly in the social media age. People made videos of themselves dumping a bucket of ice water on their heads, posted it to Facebook and challenged friends to do the same within 24 hours, or donate $100 to ALS. Plenty of people did both.

Working with Frates, a former captain of the Boston College baseball team, Quinn helped turn the challenge into a sensation. The videos spread rapidly among Quinn’s friends and family in Yonkers and New York City and then among those of Frates in Boston before becoming a viral phenomenon. By the end of the summer, everyone from LeBron James to Bill Gates to Justin Timberlake to George W. Bush had doused himself in icy water for the cause.

“What happened was amazing,” Quinn says. “It was a miracle.”

The challenge not only spread awareness, it raised money for ALS research in volumes previously unthinkable.

More than 17 million people filmed a video of themselves taking the challenge and more than $115 million was raised in six weeks for the ALS Association.

“The Ice Bucket Challenge has definitely

changed the fight against ALS forever,” said Brian Frederick, executive vice president of communications and development for the ALS Association.

Frederick said there was typically only limited awareness about ALS among people who didn’t have a direct connection to the disease. On top of the millions raised in the Ice Bucket Challenge’s first weeks, Frederick said the association’s annual fundraising has doubled from its pre-Ice Bucket numbers.

“After the Ice Bucket Challenge, there was a much more widespread awareness about ALS and more people who considered it something that we should be invested in and fighting,” Frederick added.

Quinn said the money raised has led to more research now than ever for ALS. In May, the FDA approved Radicava, the first drug approved to treat ALS in 22 years. The drug demonstrated in clinical trials that it can slow the progression of the disease.

In 2016, the ALS Association credited donations from the Ice Bucket Challenge for funding research that discovered a new ALS gene, NEK1, which ranks among the most common genes that contribute to the disease.

“So there are things happening,” Quinn said about the progress toward a cure. “Are we there yet? No. But we are on the way.”

Quinn’s work continues. Along with the Ice

Bucket challenge every August, his Twitter and Facebook feeds stay updated with news of him attending and helping out fundraising events for ALS. He is working with the GoBoldly campaign run by the Pharmaceutical Research and Manufacturers of America trade group, which highlights patients and researchers working to cure diseases.

Including his own charity, Quinn for the Win, which is run with family and friends, Quinn estimates his team has been involved in raising more than $220 million for ALS. “We are always up to something,” Quinn said, noting that the charity posts events on its webpage throughout the year.

In Westchester, the Empire City Casino and the city of Yonkers host an annual August ice bucket challenge event, while Maggie Spillane’s in Mount Vernon hosts an annual Quinntoberfest ALS benefit every October.

“I'm very lucky to have the family and friends I do,” Quinn said, adding that the city of Yonkers rallied behind him.

Quinn said its important people understand “the fight is strong and that the disease is not easy, so we must continue to fight together. Because without everyone’s support, it is impossible.”

For more, visit q4tw.com.

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THE FABRIC OF DESIGN

BY GEORGETTE GOUVEIA

A “Jardin Anglaise” jacquard slim strapless gown with appliquéd waist medallion and appliquéd tulle jacket, both with Swarovski crystal detailing, $4,400.

Photographs by Roman Makhmutov.

From left, a hand-draped and pleated strapless chiffon “pagoda” gown, $4,290; an appliquéd strapless lotus jacquard on silk faille column with an attached tulle cape with appliqué detail, $4,190; and a metallic flocked tulle racer-cut bodice high-low gown in ivory/gold with a horse-hair banded skirt, $4,170. Model – Tanya Gavrilova.

F

For many fashion designers, inspiration leads to fabric. For Alex Teih (pronounced Tay), fabric is the inspiration.

“Alex never designs a dress.

He finds a fabric and then figures out what kind of cocktail dress or gown it should be,” business partner Darrell Griffiths says at a trunk show at Mary Jane Denzer in White Plains.

Specifically, Teih transforms silk blends from France and Italy. (“They can’t get any silk fabric in Europe,” Griffiths says. “It’s all being held back in China.”) Under Teih’s alchemist eye, silver and gold threads give black a cool appearance, appliqués and Swarovski crystals add texture to tulle and chiffon and zippered denim takes on an evening cast.

The Alex Teih woman is “the mother of” — the

bride, the groom, the bar mitzvah boy, the bat mitzvah girl. But she’s also a woman like classical pianist Olga Kern, the first in more than 30 years to win the Van Cliburn International Piano Competition in 2001.

“Alex is very aware of a woman’s shape,” Griffiths says. “He’s very visual and tactile, very creative. I don’t know how he does it.”

They are a complementary duo, with Griffiths handling the business and PR side of the company, which has a showroom and studio in Manhattan, and Teih designing and supervising a small group of craftsmen. Griffiths was a self-described “Pennsylvania farm boy” who had studied American literature at Brown University and was representing other designers when he met Teih 12 years ago. Teih had been born in Odessa, Ukraine, where his father was a doctor and his grandmother a lawyer. His parents sent him to tailoring

school in keeping with another family profession.

At 20, Teih came to the United States where he studied visual merchandising at the Fashion Institute of Technology in Manhattan. He was working at Saks Fifth Avenue when his wife informed him one day that she needed a dress to attend a party given by the designer Oleg Cassini, who created the Jackie Look for first lady Jacqueline Bouvier Kennedy. Griffiths says that Teih told his (now ex) wife, “You need a dress. I’ll make you a dress.” That was 20 years ago.

Since then, his company has succeeded not only with his feel for fabric but with a graceful approach to clientele.

“I don’t like to tell someone that something looks bad on them,” Griffith says. “I like to tell them how we can make it look better.”

For more, call 212-967-2070 or email Darrell@alexteih.net and also visit mjdenzer.com.

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Inspired by a child, for others at play

BY DANIELLE RENDA

CHILDREN SEE THE WORLD AS A PLAYGROUND WITHOUT BORDERS. CARDBOARD BOXES BECOME SPACESHIPS, BED SHEETS BECOME LIVING ROOM FORTS AND DISHES BECOME RACECAR STEERING WHEELS.

Orange Lining provides children with blankets that are a source of comfort and an invitation to play.

Courtesy Orange Lining.

It’s a way of seeing the world that Ryan Flaim — the mother of two boys, ages 3 and 2 — understands well. And it’s how Ryder Gordon Brown, Flaim’s late nephew and godson, lived the three short years of his life.

In honor of Ryder — who passed away on Jan. 18, 2015 from complications of pneumonia at Boston Children’s Hospital — Flaim created Orange Lining, a children’s accessories company aimed at fostering imagination while offering constant comfort.

Each moment of youthful creativity nurtured by its products is yet another moment commemorating her nephew’s sparkling spirit.

“I knew I wanted to do something to keep Ryder’s spirit alive, to remind people that time is precious, that every day is a gift and to encourage kids to run outside and play,” Flaim says, “and to give kids the means to celebrate every magical moment and to do it together with them.”

FIT FOR HEROES Flaim — a New Rochelle native who lives in Duxbury, Massachusetts, a coastal town between Boston and Cape Cod — was initially brainstorming designs for multicolored, stimulating children’s blankets. This quickly transformed into the con-

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Clockwise, from left: Many of the blankets’ are lined with a cozy orange fabric; The new Deluxebury collection is tailored to the holiday season; Ryan Flaim, founder of Orange Lining.

Photographs courtesy Orange Lining.

explaining a childhood memory of her and her siblings beaming in their homemade hats.

And to further personalize the blankets — and make each child feel uniquely special — there is a monogramming option available for all products.

cept of capes — namely, superhero capes. Now coined the “HeroBlanket,” this multipurpose cape is made to grow with the child.

“I see how attached my own kids are to their blankies,” Flaim says. “If you give a child this blanket when they’re born, it becomes a source of comfort and safety. And, as they grow up, it becomes a source of inspiration and adventure. It just fits so squarely.”

To ensure comfort, Flaim uses quality materials to meet both kids’ needs and parents’ preferences.

The blankets — which are made in the United States — are available in a quilted, double-gauze fabric, as well as minky, a cuddle-soft material, and muslin, a featherweight cloth.

As a parent, Flaim’s chief concern is safety. In order to “stay true to the blanket, while allowing it to be safe,” she created a patent-pending design that uses Velcro closure tabs to provide a quick release.

“Kids can very easily pull off the cape, because it’s attached with Velcro,” she says. “And because of that design, it also has a lot of functionality.”

It’s this functionality that Flaim refers to as “heroically versatile, from a mom’s point of view.” Not only is the blanket made to function as a cape, but it’s also a nursing cover for mom and a tummy-time mat for babies. Due to the Velcro-fastening capabilities, it can also be attached to strollers as a partial sunshade or as a secured, “no-drop” blanket for babies who tend to kick their legs. Or, it can simply be hung as wall décor (26 inches wide).

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The blankets may accommodate children up to age 10 — and beyond — but Flaim also created a petite collection for newborns (23 inches wide). Available in two styles — Find Your Will (blue and gray) and Find Your Way (pink and gray) — they feature an adorable combination of arrows on the front with gingham on the back, fitted to accommodate children up to ages 4 or 5.

Just like Orange Lining, its name also has a story.

“The blue blanket (Find Your Will) is named after my friend Danielle’s baby, who was born earlier in the summer and unknowingly had a heart condition and had to have open heart surgery. They named him Will.”

(Will, who is now 4 months old, is doing great, Flaim says.)

With each blanket, she offers the option to purchase a crown as a bundled set. Because no superhero’s outfit is complete without the prince or princess hat, especially on his or her special day.

“That’s actually what my mom used to do for Robby, Allie and I on our birthdays,” Flaim says,

FOREVER SHINING BRIGHT The concept behind the company’s branding came from none other than Ryder’s favorite color — orange. For Ryder’s family, it was a color that came to represent messages of hope, from “beautiful brightness,” Flaim says, “to the sunrise and the sunset,” to “light and imagination.”

“When Ryder passed away, it just became a sea of orange,” she says. “There was so much about that color that just fit Ryder and the need that we had.”

Not only is orange incorporated into the company’s name and logo, but the products as well, as many of the blankets’ interiors are orange.

Then came the concept of the silver lining.

Through a conversation with Flaim’s brother, the siblings discussed this germane idea of finding hope in challenging circumstances. And so Orange Lining was formed.

“Ryder’s passing was tragic and just a terrible moment in time that’ll never go away for our family,” Flaim says. “For me, personally, it really put into perspective just how precious life is, how difficult it can be at times and how you’re not always in control of that, but you’re in control of trying to find the light, no matter how dark the day is.”

For the holiday season, Orange Lining will feature the “Deluxebury” collection — playfully named after Flaim’s town —which includes super soft blankets in minky and brushed suede, available in red or gray.

For more, visit orangelining.com or facebook. com/orangelining.

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A few of Hemlock Hill’s newest livestock additions.

A family’s farming legacy STORY AND PHOTOGRAPHS BY ALEESIA FORNI

IF YOU WOULD HAVE TOLD LAURA DEMARIA THAT ONE DAY SHE’D BECOME THE THIRD GENERATION TO FARM THE LAND THAT HAS BEEN IN HER FAMILY FOR THE BETTER PART OF A CENTURY, SHE MIGHT HAVE LAUGHED IN YOUR FACE.

Though Laura grew up on Hemlock Hill farm in Cortlandt Manor and spent her days serving as her father’s shadow as he carried out daily tasks, from erecting fences to feeding cattle, she had her eyes set on the big city.

When the time came to carve out her own path, Laura went off to college and later landed a job with MTV in Manhattan, spending her days commuting to the office in Times Square and heading back to the farm each night.

But it wasn’t long — six months, to be exact — before she realized her future was at Hemlock Hill.

“This was where I wanted to be,” she says on a recent brisk fall afternoon, gesturing to the open fields her family has owned for generations.

The farm has been in the DeMaria family since 1939, when Laura’s grandfather, Bronx-born Nicolas J. DeMaria, fulfilled his city-kid dreams of farm ownership and purchased the 120-acre property.

After discovering the scores of hemlock trees that dotted his new land, DeMaria christened the farm Hemlock Hill.

Laura’s father, John, took over the farm in 1957 after tragedy struck the family and the eldest DeMaria passed away. The Cornell-educated son expanded

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the farm’s operations to include a butcher shop and began selling products direct to consumers.

Today, Hemlock Hill stands as one of the largest family-owned farms in the region. The DeMarias raise an assortment of livestock, from cattle and pigs to ducks and turkeys, along with fresh produce.

“My father was pressured to sell this farm for years and went through hard times,” Laura says, “and now it’s really paying off.”

Like her father before her, Laura is also looking for new opportunities for the farm.

Hemlock Hill recently opened a newly renovated market that will greet customers year-round.

The store sells a range of their all-natural, farmraised meats, as well as their fresh produce and more than 200 local products.

Another new addition to the farm property is a food truck, which features cheeseburgers, bacon and egg sandwiches and other dishes that incorporate Hemlock Hill meats and vegetables.

“It’s just really unique here,” she says. “We are raising the livestock, we are processing the livestock, we are selling it direct to you all on the same farm.”

Local chefs have taken notice. Dave DiBari,

Laura DeMaria on her family’s farm in Cortlandt Manor.

the man behind the ever-popular The Cookery in Dobbs Ferry, is a longtime customer, sourcing eggs, chicken and pork from the farm. Nearby eateries, including Peekskill Brewery and Birdsall House, are among two of the largest local restaurant partners.

“Chefs love fresh meat, they have a thing against frozen meat, so this is really going to open up a lot of opportunities to work with restaurants and small grocery stores to sell our meat,” she says.

Renting out the property for special occasions is

also something the farm plans to explore in the future. Already it has already hosted a fall barbeque and turkey tasting for the Thanksgiving holiday.

“This is a beautiful location,” she says. “A lot of people want to have a private events here. We’re open to it.”

In order to take advantage of the farm’s new, modern look, Hemlock Hill plans to host a farm dinner Dec. 16, offering guests a chance to sample some of its delicacies courtesy of Bonnie Briar Country Club chef Matthew O’Connor. A sneak peek at the menu yielded paté with mustard seed caviar and pickle relish, glazed pork belly and wine pairings from Peekskill’s Dylan’s Wine Cellar.

“It’s exciting,” Laura says. “There’s so much opportunity and everyone is so excited that we’re here.”

So, how does the elder DeMaria feel about all the changes coming to the farm?

“There’s almost 50 years between my father and I, so that’s a huge generational gap,” says Laura, who lives in a quaint home just across a stone path from her father and the house she grew up in. “My dad is pretty progressive in the way he thinks. He gets it. He’s open to the change.”

For more, visit hemlockhillfarm.com.

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THERE’S NOTHING LIKE A HOUSE IN THE COUNTRY – PARTICULARLY IF THAT “COUNTRY” IS LOCATED IN AN EXCLUSIVE SUBURB WITH ALL KINDS OF AMENITIES AND CLOSE PROXIMITY TO NEW YORK CITY. Such is this elegant Greenwich residence off deliciously winding Round Hill Road. The 9,340-square-foot home sits on four acres off a long driveway that gives way to riding trails and English gardens designed by Simon Johnson, thus ensuring privacy and tranquility in the most gracious of manners.

The house itself offers a six-bedroom/six-bath/ one powder room layout with a kidney-shaped pool and attached guest quarters — a perfect arrangement for today's lifestyle with a dramatic two-story family room with a stone fireplace, a breakfast room and an English conservatory for cozying up on long winter days.

Upstairs, the three en-suite family/guest bedrooms, outfitted with built-in desks and custom closets, have their own wing. The expansive master suite includes a master bath, a sitting room/nursery, office and two walk-in closets.

There is a second family room/play area in the lower walk-out level with a fireplace and a guest/ au pair suite.

The well-appointed guesthouse, designed by James Schettino with a separate entrance, includes a large living room/office, a bedroom with full bath, a gym and a third garage bay.

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To Russia (and back), with love

BY GEORGETTE GOUVEIA

David Hallberg returning to the stage after a two and a half year absence. Photograph by Kent G. Becker. From Hallberg’s “A Body of Work” (Touchstone/Simon & Schuster).

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HE IS, IN A SENSE, THE REVERSE-NUREYEV. WHEREAS RUDOLF NUREYEV WAS ALL DARKLING DIONYSIAN FIRE ON THE BALLET STAGE, DAVID HALLBERG – PALE AND BLOND, WITH LONG, LEAN LIMBS – POSSESSES AN APOLLONIAN COOL THAT WOULD SUIT HIM IN, WELL, GEORGE BALANCHINE’S “APOLLO.”

Their trajectories are mirror images, too. In 2011, Hallberg, a principal dancer with American Ballet Theatre, joined the Bolshoi Ballet in Moscow — the first American to do so — a half-century after Nureyev made his leap from behind the Iron Curtain to dance in the West.

Hallberg’s “defection” wasn’t quite as dramatic as Nureyev’s standoff with Kirov Ballet officials and his KGB minders at Le Bourget Airport in Paris. “I just got on a plane,” Hallberg says. But like Nureyev, he is proving to be a trailblazing crossover artist — starring in a video for Nike and sporting Jean Schlumberger’s Bird on a Rock clip for Tiffany & Co.’s fall ad campaign.

Indeed, he tells WAG that what inspired him about Nureyev wasn’t his dancing “but a biography of how he lived his life. It was his insatiable curiosity that inspired me. You have to look all around you to become complete.”

Hallberg echoes that thought later in a conversation with choreographer Peter Pucci before an audience at the Jacob Burns Film Center in Pleas-

David Hallberg in Moscow’s Red Square experiencing the challenges of a Russian winter. From Hallberg’s “A Body of Work” (Touchstone/Simon & Schuster). Photograph courtesy the author.

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antville: “Risk was it. For me as an artist, I’ve always thrived on that risk, the unknown.”

The occasion of his comments is the first selection in the Burns’ annual “Dance on Film” series, the fascinating 2015 docudrama “Rudolf Nureyev: Dance to Freedom,” in which Bolshoi Ballet star Artem Ovcharenko captures Nureyev’s androgynous good looks and singular self-possession amid an alternately tense and amusing Cold War setting that resonates in today’s political climate.

“He is one of the most warm-hearted, easiest to get along with guys,” Hallberg says of Ovcharenko, “and I’m so happy for him. No one is more deserving of this opportunity. He’s a beautiful dancer with long lines.”

The Burns’ screening is also the occasion of a signing for Hallberg’s new memoir, “A Body of Work: Dancing to the Edge and Back” (Touchstone/Simon & Schuster, $28, 424 pages), an astonishingly candid and evocative portrait of an artist who — despite childhood bullying, a peripatetic lifestyle that has required constant cultural readjustment and a career-threatening injury — is never less than comfortable in his own skin.

Certainly, that centeredness — akin to Nureyev’s — stood him in good stead during his three years (2011-14) in Moscow. Fast-paced, formidable and forbidding, Moscow, like New York, is not a place where the meek shall inherit the earth. In Hallberg’s telling, you can feel the pressure of impatient shoppers at the supermarkets and the disdain of the checkers as your credit card fails to work the second time. And you can practically smell the cat urine at the Bolshoi Theatre — the result of what Hallberg calls feline Phantoms of the Opera — and see its creamy Corinthian columns, topped by a pediment crowned with Apollo driving his steeds.

A tough, imposing town. “But as I make very clear in the book, I was never mistreated,” says Hallberg, who had been there a dozen times before.

“There was no anti-Americanism, no harm, no stereotyping.”

In contrast to his days at the Paris Opera Ballet School — where he was scornfully known as l’Amérique, “the America” — he says, “Everyone involved in the Bolshoi was welcoming.”

And in Hallberg — who blends a subtly immaculate technique with

Hallberg in Nike’s “I, David” video, directed by Niclas Gillis, with a set design by artist James Casebere, part of the sportswear giant’s “Objects of Desire” campaign.

Hallberg wear’s NikeLab’s ACG Poncho.

a soulful acting style — the Bolshoi had a sponge waiting to soak up all the company had to offer, including a bold, visceral style that is often contrasted with the refined classicism of the Kirov, to which Hallberg would seem better suited.

“I was so happy to learn how to use my body in a different way,” Hallberg says. “I didn’t want to lose my identity as a dancer, but I wanted to absorb the style.”

In Russia, ballet dancing is not considered an unmanly profession, as it is still, unfortunately, in the United States. Yet President Vladimir Putin’s anti-gay agenda has been well-documented. Nevertheless, Hallberg — who writes frankly about his sexual awakening as a gay teen and the brutal bullying he endured growing up in Phoenix — was never harassed in Moscow.

As he made friends among the city’s artists, it opened up to him — reminding us that it’s not where you are so much as who you’re with where you are.

At the banya, or sauna — where Hallberg would go on his day off to ease his aching limbs — he and the other dancers had a special status. In one of

Hallberg embraces Svetlana Lunkina after a performance of the Bolshoi Ballet’s “Swan Lake.”

Photograph by Henry Leutwyler. From Hallberg’s “A Body of Work” (Touchstone/Simon & Schuster).

the book’s most poignant moments, an acquaintance named Genia musters the courage to ask him for tickets to the Bolshoi as a treat for himself and his girlfriend on Woman’s Day. “Like many Russians,” Hallberg writes, “he had been told as a child that maybe one day, instead of watching Bolshoi on TV, he could actually see a live performance at the historic theater….It gave me as much fulfillment to give Genia those tickets as receiving the tickets gave him.”

Moscow has not been the only “M” city to loom large in Hallberg’s life and memoir. Melbourne played a big part after he was sidelined in 2014 by an injury to his left ankle that required two surgeries. Dancers measure the length of their careers in dog years. “I lost two and a half years,” he says. “That’s 15 years in the dance world.”

But it was more than that, he adds: “I lost everything that defined who I was.”

He shaved his fine blond mane — “like shedding an old skin” — and moved to Australia, where he rehabbed and hung out in pubs.

“I never had my college years,” he says. “I always had to get up the next day (for dance class). So it

was nice to sit in a pub and talk to the bartender.”

Today, Hallberg is back with ABT, performing with the company during the past spring season.

He’s also a resident guest artist at The Australian Ballet, appearing there twice a year. Next year sees him guesting with The Royal Ballet, while at ABT, he and Natalia Osipova — with whom he has an electric, complementary partnership — will perform “Giselle” on May 18, their birthday.

“I feel like a completely different artist. I use the word ‘rebirth,’” he says. “You don’t know gratitude until something has been taken away from you.”

He is paying that gratitude forward with the David Hallberg Scholarship for boys aspiring to ballet careers.

“I couldn’t understand why I couldn’t fit in,” Hallberg says of the bullying. Dance became his safe place and the passion for dance the overwhelming counterweight to others’ expectations.

“That’s why having come out the other end, I’m determined to help boys in ballet. I can say, ‘I went through this.’”

And triumphed.

For more, visit davidhallberg.com.

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WARES

HOLIDAY LIGHTS

BY JANE MORGAN

Light and light-filled holidays brighten the winter.

I

I’ve just come back from the most marvelously jubilant scene — “The Great Jack O’Lantern Blaze” at Van Cortland Manor in Croton-on-Hudson. It’s a truly breathtaking display of wildly carved pumpkins lit up with candles from the inside and gathered in a critical mass along a walking path through a pastoral estate (and behind a Stop & Shop, as my son noted). Although it was obviously representative of Halloween, the light it generated felt more like a universally celebratory experience. As I think about what exactly makes a holiday or event look festive, I believe it is light and its visceral effect that have the power to make us feel happy in the moment. Winter holidays are pretty much all about illumination, both in the physical and spiritual sense — Diwali, Hanukkah, Christmas, Kwanzaa and Winter Solstice to name a few. Even holiday sweaters have shimmer knit in them.

Many years ago, when I was living displaced in a neighborhood in Brooklyn that is still not gentrified and probably never will be, I used to pass by rows of little houses on my way to the subway every day. They were slightly dirty, a little roughedup and remarkable only in the fact that they were unremarkable. Except one. Like a little kid striding bravely up to a teacher and demanding to be noticed amid a classroom of identical faces, this one house screamed for attention so loudly that it was impossible to dismiss its cry.

Every discernable surface was covered in decorations ranging from lights to flags to figurines and inflatables to electrified signage, bulbs, baubles and even edibles mounted and proffered with pride. I

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was usually highly judgmental of the extreme holiday lawn decorations we all slow our cars and our pace to look at. But whether I liked this personal statement or not, it held my fascination. I saw the humanity in it. This homeowner’s desire to spread light into the world reached me and made me smile.

It was a wonder — a wonder of excess, a wonder of color and a wonder of inspiration, which can strike in any form if we are willing to see it that way.

About a week before Valentine’s Day, damned if that house wasn’t fully loaded again, with hearts spilling out of its coffers. I decided to risk losing my citizenship as a disaffected New Yorker one day by knocking on the door while passing by. A tiny woman appeared, her jet-black hair sprayed to a full stop with fixative. I told her how much I liked her holiday embellishments and how unique I thought they were. She proceeded to invite me in to talk about them and show me the inside of her house.

Yes, this really happened. Suspending all disbelief, I stepped into her living room, where every square inch was also replete with painstakingly installed thematic flourishes. She was the nicest person and was truly grateful for my acknowledgment of what I, at this point, realized was nothing short of folk art. I stayed only briefly, turning down refreshment and left with a glow on my face.

I only lived in that neighborhood for about another month and, as I had no ties to the area, I never went back. Every holiday that came around for the next couple of years though, I thought of her.

Today, I can only wonder if the house still has the spark of her winningly festive spirit.

For more, visit janemorganinteriordesign.com.

Fairweather Farm, North Salem, NY An icon of North Salem country living. Stone walls, babbling brooks & mown paths traverse 22+ acres of unspoiled pasture. The main house atop a knoll, tucked between a boxwood garden & in-ground heated pool. Colonial Revival home seamlessly blends original detail & modern amenities. The spacious public rm’s all feature fplce. Spacious EIK w/high-end appliances. Master suite w/a fireplace, bay window, WIC, & en-suite bath. 2 BRs connected by a full bath; guest rm w/en-suite bath. Immaculately restored caretaker’s cottage, barn/studio w/ 2 apartments totaling 3BR’s. Splendid potential for horses. MLS#4601218 Price: $3,500,000

North Salem, NY Country Estate w/inspiring views & glorious space for gatherings. High ceilings, exposed beams, custom millwork, wide plank hardwood floors, floor to ceiling windows. Gourmet Kitchen w/sitting area & fplce. Formal D/R. Fabulous Stone fplce. & Full Size Bar. Game Room. Office. 5 BR, 4 ½ Baths w/a 1st floor Master. Rooms flow into the Outdoor Landscape of multiple Stone Patios, Outdoor BBQ, Gunite Pool, Tennis Court & Basketball Court on over 8 Acres. 2,758 additional sq. ft. of Finished Lower Level provides a Playroom, Fitness Room, Guest suite& access to patio & pool. Generator. Adjoining 11.3 ACRE parcel available to purchase separately. MLS#4652365 Price: $1,850,000

North Salem, NY Harmony at Grants Farm awaits on this private lane. As the water hits gently on the pond you are transported to your own little paradise. This meticulously maintained turnkey 4 BR 3 ½ Bth center hall colonial w/great flow. Set on 5.1 acres w/breathtaking views you will enjoy the comforts of home w/a kitchen made for the serious cook. Prof. kitchen, tumbled tile backsplash, granite tops, mahogany cabinets, wine refrigerator on the island & plenty of storage, formal DR, hard wood floors throughout, Crown molding, French doors, 2 fireplaces, cathedral ceiling w/beams in the MB w/a large walk in closet, decks throughout,full house generator, new above ground oil tank, new roof, new gravel driveway. Full finished walk out basement that could be used as a separate suite for your guest.MLS#4728841 Price: $925,000

Pound Ridge, NY Follow the stone walls down buccolic Fancher Rd to this 6 BR, 5 1/2 Bath Colonial set amid tranquility on 6.8 acres. Open Flow & High Ceilings provide glorious light & warmth. Gourmet Kitchen, Fam Rm w/Stone FPL, Din Rm, Liv Rm w/FPL, Office, Wet Bar, Bed/Study w/ Full Bath, Mudroom. MB w/Stone FPL, Sitting Area, Walk-In Closets & Master Bath w/Steam Shower, 4 addt’l Beds & 3 Full Baths, Huge Walk-Up Attic, 2 Laundry Rms. Addt’l Finished 2,200 Sq Ft on Lower Level w/Rec Rm, Game Rm, Theatre, Gym, & Walk-Out. Private Backyard w/Bluestone Patio & Gunite Salt-Water Heated Pool. 3 Car Heated Garage, Full House Stand-by Generator. MLS# 4701347 Price: $1,695,000

Brewster, NY Located off a country road at the end of a private cul-de-sac, this bright and sunny front porch Colonial on 3.5 landscaped acres with distant views has 4 bedrooms and 3.5 baths. This finely detailed home includes an open floorplan concept with an updated gourmet kitchen, handcrafted fieldstone fireplace, polished hardwood floors, large oversized windows and a first floor master suite with beautiful French doors leading to the rear patio. The strategically placed first floor guest suite allows for comfortable visits for both guests and their hosts. Minutes to major highways, shopping, and trains!

Price: $890,000

WEAR

A LADY OF GRACE

BY GEORGETTE GOUVEIA

Avril Graham at The Westchester. Photograph by Nicole Taylor.

W

e’re talking to Avril Graham, executive fashion and beauty editor of Harper’s Bazaar, at Tiffany & Co. in The Westchester when a young waiter approaches — a very young waiter.

“Would you like a goat cheese and beet hors d’oeuvre?” asks the gentleman, of about 10 or 12 years old.

“Well,” Graham says, beaming at him and her interviewer, “we can hardly refuse such a charming offer.”

She takes one and we follow suit. We’re sure the waiter floats through the rest of the event — a splendid afternoon of lunch and curated shopping presented by Harper’s, celebrating its 150th anniversary, and The Westchester, a Simon mall in White Plains. But then, that’s Graham for you, a lady of grace who believes in bestowing that graciousness on all, whether it’s a pint-sized waiter or Paula Kelliher, The Westchester’s director of marketing.

“No one has made me feel more welcome and no one had done more to reinvent retail here,” Graham says of Kelliher and of The Westchester, with its new eateries and play area for youngsters.

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“Put it this way,” she tells us back at Tiffany, “everyone deserves to be treated with the same level of respect. Everyone goes around hoping for a great day. Let’s not make it a bad day.”

It’s hard to imagine Graham having a bad day — or even a bad hair day. She’s just gotten off the redeye from Los Angeles, though you’d never know it from her crisp, impeccable, look — blond bob, floral print L.K. Bennett blouse, black Piazza Sempione culottes, black leather jacket and tan and black heeled sandals. It’s a blend of high end and populist that puts her in stylistic company of such fashionistas as Michelle Obama and Catherine, Duchess of Cambridge. It’s also a look that cleverly, seamlessly blends many of the trends that she talks about at the event. Noticing that most of the 75 attendees are wearing black — and fashionable black leather at that — she says that this go-to color is just a jumping off point this season.

“We’re going to get you into patterns, textures, prints,” she says.

And plenty of florals. Along with velvet and nifty shades of red, florals are one of the hottest trends, spearheaded in part by Gucci.

“We always think of florals in spring and summer,” she tells us at Tiffany. “What Gucci has brought

us is the idea that we can embrace flowers and femininity without making them old-fashioned.”

Like the floral-print Ted Baker dress worn by the Titian-tressed Raven, whose business, Modern Divination, offers “Oracles As Entertainment.” As we chat with Graham, Raven does chocolate readings. (You select a piece from a box of Godiva and she tells you about yourself and your future. Life, as it turns out, really is like a box of chocolates.) It’s one of the “many surprises” that Graham says are in store for the 75 event participants, including personalized haikus at Stuart Weitzman, where she talks about her love for the company’s silver velvet bootie; Louis Vuitton, where fashion illustrator Bil Donovan turns us into glam Vuitton models; and Neiman Marcus, where KC Creations presents us with a bouquet of roses in sherbet colors, the kind that festoon a garden gate and a garland centerpiece the runs the length of the banquet table on The Westchester’s Level 1. (Other participating retailers include David Yurman, Hugo Boss, Marc Cain and Shinola.)

There’s Graham at each of the stores — noting their strengths, “no pressure to shop,” she says jokingly; greeting guests at the banquet; and giving WAG a shoutout.

It’s that combination of kindness and a keen eye that have made her stand out as an editor in a world not always known for generosity. But Graham says she had an epiphany while she was a student in London in the summer of 1981 when Prince Charles married the future Diana, Princess of Wales. Graham shared a flat near Blackfriars Bridge, which was part of the wedding route. Joining the throng of well-wishers, she noticed sanitation workers putting down sawdust so the horses drawing the royal carriages wouldn’t slip and waving at the crowds.

This taught her something valuable: “Everyone has a job to do, and every job is important.”

Particularly when, like Graham, you perform that job exceedingly well.

For more, visit harpersbazaar.com and simon. com/mall/the-westchester.

Avril Graham also attended the opening of “Volez, Voguez, Voyagez — Louis Vuitton,” an exhibit at the American Stock Exchange Building in Manhattan through Jan. 7 that charts the history of the House of Louis Vuitton from 1854 to the present. (It’s the subject of a spread in Harper’s Bazaar’s 150th anniversary issue.)

For more, visit louisvuitton.com.

FITNESS HEALTH &

Throughout human history, bodies – of varied shapes and sizes – have been the subject of curiosity, concern and especially this time of year, indulgence. On these pages, we share a selection of 21st-century services designed to cater to these, our bodies.

'Viridian Stance' acrylic and oil pastel painting by Teil Duncan.

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Why live with a bad knee when you live near the best surgeons?

The world-class care of Hospital for Special Surgery is now available in White Plains. HSS Westchester offers care for all ages including advanced imaging, medical diagnosis, physical therapy, pre- and postoperative care and sports performance services.

To learn more or make an appointment, please call 877-606-1555 or visit hss.edu/Westchester

Dr. Randy Stevens is Director of

Radiation Oncology at the White Plains Hospital Center for Cancer Care. She also serves as Chair of the Hospital’s Institutional Review Board (IRB), to review, approve and monitor the many research studies and clinical trials involving White Plains Hospital patients.

Dr. Stevens received her medical degree from NYU, where she also completed her post graduate training. She has published several scholarly articles in peer reviewed journals related to the role of radiation in the treatment of precancerous and early stage breast cancer as well as gynecologic cancers.

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Active in many national and local societies, Dr. Stevens is a member of the Susan G. Komen Foundation Greater New York’s Medical Advisory Committee. She also serves as Vice President of the New York Metropolitan Breast Cancer Group, Surveyor and Chair of Education and Dissemination for the National Accreditation Program for Breast Centers (NAPBC), Representative for the American Society for Radiation Oncology (ASTRO) to the NAPBC Board, and as Past President of the New York Roentgen Society.

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r. Gruen is fellowship-trained in oncologic imaging with expertise in breast and body imaging. He was one of the first in the state to perform MRI guided breast biopsies, and is a nationally regarded specialist on breast radiology.

Dr. Gruen is an expert on all aspects of breast imaging, including 3D mammography, screening and diagnostic ultrasound, breast MRI, high-risk assessment and evaluation, management of complex cases and minimally invasive breast biopsy.

He is a frequent lecturer on breast cancer and women’s health, both locally and nationally, as well as on social media.

He serves on several state and national committees focusing on healthcare policy and economics, patient centered care, breast health and access to breast cancer screening.

HOSPITAL AFFILIATION

NewYork-Presbyterian Lawrence Hospital 55 Palmer Avenue Bronxville, NY 10708 (914) 787-1000 nyp.org/lawrence

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r. Maureen Killackey is Clinical Director of the NewYork-Presbyterian Lawrence Hospital Cancer Center and Professor of Medicine and Obstetrics and Gynecology (in the Herbert Irving Comprehensive Cancer Center) at the Columbia University Medical Center. After graduating from Columbia’s Barnard College, she earned her MD at Cornell Weill Medical College and trained at New York Hospital and Memorial Sloan Kettering. Dr. Killackey’s cancer care career began in 1982, when she served as a gynecologic/surgical oncologist. Since 2000, she has held clinical directorships at multidisciplinary cancer programs in rural, suburban, and urban areas, as well as community-based and academic centers.

She is a peer reviewer for multiple medical journals and reviews grants for the National Cancer Institute. She contributes to the efforts of the American Cancer Society, Society of Gynecologic Oncology, the American College of Obstetrics and Gynecology, American College of Surgeons, and Commission on Cancer. In New York State, she chairs the Early Detection and Cancer Education Advisory Council, serves on the Steering Committee of the Cancer Consortium, and contributes to the Comprehensive Cancer Plan 2012 - 2017. She is focused on achieving the national goal of “80% by 2018” for colorectal cancer screening and increasing HPV vaccine rates. Dr. Killackey is committed to ensuring access to the highest quality of patient-centered, multidisciplinary, coordinated, and integrated oncology care in the community.

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MEMBERSHIPS:

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WESTCHESTER MEDICAL CENTER HEALTH NETWORK 100 Woods Road, Valhalla, NY 10595 | 877-WMC-DOCS (962-3627) | WWW.WMCHEALTH.ORG

WESTCHESTER MEDICAL CENTER HEALTH NETWORK (WMCHealth) is a comprehensive network of care focused on advancing the health and well being of the Hudson Valley. As a 1,700-bed health care system based in Valhalla, WMCHealth is a lifeline for our region, spanning 6,200 square miles – 10 hospitals on eight Hudson Valley campuses. WMCHealth’s flagship Westchester Medical Center – the region’s advanced care resource – cares for more than 120,000 patients each year. WMCHealth now includes MidHudson Regional Hospital in Poughkeepsie, St. Anthony Community Hospital in Warwick, Good Samaritan Hospital in Suffern, Bon Secours Community Hospital in Port Jervis, HealthAlliance Hospital: Broadway Campus and HealthAlliance Hospital: Mary’s Avenue Campus in Kingston, and Margaretville Hospital in Margaretville, in addition to Westchester Medical Center, Maria Fareri Children’s Hospital and the Behavioral Health Center in Valhalla.

The network has a workforce of more than 12,000, with nearly 3,000 attending physicians providing the finest care at all levels for the children and adults of the region. From Level 1 and 2 Trauma Centers, the region’s only children’s hospital, an academic medical center, several community hospitals and numerous health-related centers, programs and services, WMC-Health is the leading provider of integrated health in our region.

SPECIALTIES AND RESEARCH As the flagship of WMCHealth and the only advanced care medical center in our region, Westchester Medical Center and the network’s Valhalla campus are home to: • WMCHealth's Heart & Vascular Institute, the region’s largest multispecialty cardiovascular program, offering the very best in cardiology, cardiothoracic surgery and vascular surgery in multiple locations in the Hudson Valley.

• A transplant center that offers state-of-the-art care for patients of all ages who require kidney, liver, heart, corneal and bone marrow transplants.

• Maria Fareri Children’s Hospital, the region’s only all-specialty children’s hospital, featuring a staff of more than 300 professionals, as well as the region’s only pediatric ICU and Level IV neonatal ICU. • The only Level I adult and pediatric trauma center in our region and the only burn center between New York City and the Canadian border.

• Cutting-edge cancer and neuroscience programs, as well as a specialized pediatric hematology/oncology center offering dedicated programs in bone marrow transplant and chemotherapy.

NOTEWORTHY ACCOMPLISHMENTS • Westchester Medical Center and Maria Fareri Children’s Hospital are only the second organization in New York state to receive Level I trauma verification

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Westchester Medical Center Maria Fareri Children’s Hospital Behavioral Health Center MidHudson Regional Hospital Bon Secours Community Hospital Good Samaritan Hospital St. Anthony Community Hospital HealthAlliance Hospital: Broadway Campus HealthAlliance Hospital: Mary’s Avenue Campus Margaretville Hospital

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status from the American College of Surgeons for both children and adults.

• WMCHealth’s 280,000-square-foot Ambulatory Care Pavilion, the largest healthcare construction project in Westchester County in decades, is currently under construction on the network’s Valhalla campus and is scheduled to open in 2018.

• WMCHealth launched a multiyear partnership with global technology company Royal Philips to transform the delivery of quality care, including the launch of a TeleHealth program.

• Westchester Medical Center’s Valhalla campus recently unveiled an all new main concourse and stateof-the-art Caregiver Center to offer family members needed amenities as their loved ones receive care in the hospital.

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WMCHealth brings you the region’s leading network of preventive, primary, specialty and advanced care, right where you live.

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A double joint replacement became Neal’s best defense against pain.

After suffering from debilitating knee pain for years, Aikido instructor Neal decided it was time to fight back. He chose White Plains Hospital Center for Orthopedic & Spine Surgery where Dr. Daniel Markowicz performed life-changing knee replacement surgery. With the help of an expert orthopedic team and personalized follow-up care, Neal beat his knee pain, once and for all. Now, he’s returned to teaching martial arts, and recommending the team at White Plains Hospital to members of the dojo.

Find your pain relief at exceptionaleveryday.org/joint or call (914) 849-MyMD 86

WAGMAG.COM DECEMBER 2017 A M E M B E R O F T H E M O N T E F I O R E H E A LT H S Y S T E M

ColumbiaDoctors Radiology introduces their newest state-of-the-art facility now in Westchester County The Department of Radiology at Columbia University Medical Center has opened a new facility in Westchester County at 155 White Plains Road, Tarrytown, New York.

The location features brand new, state-of-the-art equipment (MRI, CT, Ultrasound, X-ray and Interventional Radiology services). ColumbiaDoctors Radiology accepts most insurances. To confirm your coverage, please call us at 212-326-8518. Our facility offers free parking and same day appointments.

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Call today to schedule an appointment: 212-326-8518

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DECEMBER 2017

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WEAR

FAIRY-TALE FACES

BY DANIELLE RENDA

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alloy handles for easy grip. They are conveniently There’s something magical about encased in a custom rose pouch. the power of makeup.

There’s certainly no eye look that’s finished withWith a touch of cheek contourout pristine mascara, which is where the Quill & ing, a bold lip color and some eyeInk set ($39) comes in handy. The gold metal pen lash TLC, any woman can trans— evocative of an antique feather quill — includes a form her soft, daytime look into a water-resistant, gel, matte black eyeliner that is vegdramatic evening effect — simply by accentuating an, cruelty-free — and even boasts being gluten-free, her natural features. as well.

But Storybook Cosmetics, an online makeup The vision behind this mystical brand belongs to boutique, brings a new, enchanting twist to this identical triplets Erin, Mandy and Missy Maynard, already spellbinding process. Combining the art of who never left behind their love for make-believe. cosmetics with childhood fairy tales, the company Created as a passion project by the Omaha naoffers original products reminiscent of “storybook” tives — who appeared on ABC’s “American Idol” as classics, such as Roald Dahl’s “Charlie and the Chocteens — the line went viral in October 2016, and has olate Factory” and Francis Hodgson Burnett’s “The remained a hot (cosmetics) commodity ever since.

Secret Garden;” and, of course, the fantasy world “We are really proud to offer a mix of both liof spells, riddles, mythical creatures and wizardry censed (collaborations) and products that are our that constitutes J.K. Rowling’s “Harry Potter” series own unique creations, inspired by all of the magical and J.R.R. Tolkien’s “The Hobbit.” stories we grew up with and loved,” Erin Maynard The original products, which include lipsticks, has said. eye palettes and applicator brushes, embrace the Recently, Storybook Cosmetics introduced a themes of these tales with playful packaging. The Mean Girls Burn Book Storybook palette ($55), a colWizardry and Witchcraft Eyeshadow Palette Storylaboration between the brand and Paramount Picbook ($55), for example, includes a set of 12 pigmenttures, and a testament to teen comedy, “Mean Girls.” ed matte, metallic and pearl eye shadows — which (And yes, from the looks of it, it’s “totally fetch.”) are cruelty-free, long-lasting and buttery smooth Something quite different, however, is in the — housed in a compact evocative of a vintage spell works — the Starry Night Palette, an eye shadow book. Among the shades are broomstick (rusty collection evocative of Vincent van Gogh’s swirling brown), sorcerer (ruby red), cloak (graphite grey), canvas, on view at The Museum of Modern Art. potions (emerald green), prophecy (pearly white), For more, visit storybookcosmetics.com.

Salem (frosted pewter), Merlin (sapphire blue), bewitched (coppery gold), cauldron (charcoal black), spell book (rich mahogany), charms (shell pink) and jinx (shimmering silver). And, just like any good compact case, the spell book includes a cosmetic mirror.

To apply the shades, the brand features dreamy brushes — for which it is most known — such as the What’s in a Name Rose Brushes ($55). This set of four — which includes a taper highlighting brush, an angled contour and blush brush, a flat-top powder brush and a dometop powder brush — are made with cruelty-free, synthetic bristles in a wicked scarlet ombre supported by a green rose stem with metal What’s in a Name Rose Brushes, $55. Courtesy Storybook Cosmetics.

Cami Weinstein Designs, LLC 203 - 661 - 4700 • CAMIDESIGNS.COM 200 PEMBERWICK ROAD • Greenwich, CT 06830

WEAR

MADE IN THE U.S.A.

BY DANIELLE RENDA The new Shinola store at The Westchester. Courtesy Shinola.

S

Shinola describes itself as a lifestyle brand.

And boy, it sure lives up to that description.

Make that an American lifestyle brand as it’s made in the U.S. of A. The Detroit-based company, which recently selected The Westchester for its 25th domestic location, offers everything imaginably necessary without compromising the necessity to look sleek.

Need an extension cord for your home? They’ve got snazzy, colorful ones that you’ll never lose.

Looking for a rustic bag that’s made to last? Shinola’s leather collection — which is manufactured using materials exclusively from American tanneries — can easily transition from work to play, with pockets for safekeeping laptops and phones and enough room for a change of clothes (for life on the go).

In search of the ideal stocking stuffer? Fine leather journals with monogramming options are the sure solution. Or what about a heavy duty yet comfortable headphone set, which is any commuter’s dream?

Though if you need a gift for the mister or missus on your list, Shinola’s watches — arguably, the company’s best-known product — are made using stainless steel and sapphire crystal to withstand the proverbial test of time, albeit with a limited lifetime warranty. And no matter whether you’re a homebody or a thrill seeker, these watches — available in battery-operated or kinetic options — don’t judge. Some selections can be worn, stress-free, while bathing (with a steel band, of course), while others can be worn — equally stress-free — while diving up to 1,000 feet below sea. Take your pick,

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and with the Willard Bar — custom watch program named after Willard Bixby, one of the founders of the 1920s shoe polish brand for which the company is named — you can customize your watch, from the face to the strap and even the engraving, all instore at The Westchester.

“While we continue to expand our retail footprint in the U.S., our launch into Westchester is an important next step in our roll-out plans,” says Tom Lewand, CEO of Shinola. “We already have three free-standing storefronts in New York City and I felt the timing was right to look beyond metropolitan New York, and Westchester was a great fit.”

Shinola strongly emphasizes its American roots, having selected Detroit as its headquarters for good reason. Looking to bring production jobs back to the United States, Shinola executives believed that Detroit’s history of automobile manufacturing would be ideal for its watch craftsmanship — and they were right. Experts from Ronda AG, a Switzerland-based manufacturer of quartz and mechanical watch movements, trained Shinola craftsmen — and former automobile manufacturers — for one year on how to assemble watch movements perfectly. Shinola designates them Argonite movements to reflect their excellent timekeeping.

All of Shinola watches — which are available at 27 international locations and on its e-commerce site — are hand-assembled in Detroit’s Argonaut Building.

(In addition to creating ultra-modern products, Shinola is also moving into hospitality, collaborating with Detroit-based real estate developer Bedrock on a 130-room boutique hotel, slated to open in the fall of 2018.)

Shinola is at 125 Westchester Ave., Suite 3350 in White Plains. For more, visit shinola.com.

WEAR

Clockwise from top, Jarretière cuff bracelet, Van Cleef & Arpels, 1937-1939, ruby and diamond cuff bracelet, made for Marlene Dietrich. © Van Cleef & Arpels. Courtesy B Moulin; Star of Light Ring, Wallace Chan, 2015-16. White jade, yellow diamonds and pink sapphires depict a new plum flower. Courtesy Wallace Chan; Bulgari choker, 1979. Choker with oval medallions of concentric cabochon rubies, brilliant-cut diamonds and lapis lazuli, joined by gold chains and smaller sapphire cabochons. Courtesy Bulgari Archives, Rome.

NO PRICE ABOVE THEM

BY GEORGETTE GOUVEIA

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Diamonds may be a girl’s best friend, but not even they can outshine the ruby.

“The last 70 years have seen the clever and persuasive marketing of diamonds,” gemologist Joanna Hardy writes in her new book “Ruby: The King of Gems” (Thames & Hudson, $125, 320 pages). “Yet rubies are far rarer than white diamonds, a fact that is being recognized in the world-record-breaking prices they set at auction.”

If the worthy woman of Proverbs is a “price far above rubies,” her modern counterpart knows a ruby’s value. Rubies have been worn by bellwethers from Elizabeth I to Elizabeth II to Elizabeth Taylor. No wallflowers they, nor were Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis, Audrey Hepburn, Marlene Dietrich, Princess Grace, the Duchess of Windsor and Princess Margaret, to name but a few who loved their rubies center stage with diamonds as the supporting player. (Take that, diamonds.)

“Maybe it is subconscious, but there seems to be a common belief that rubies are not for

the faint-hearted,” Hardy writes. “Women with attitude and strength, who ooze passion and are wildly independent have chosen to wear rubies or have been given ruby-set jewels by their admirers.”

History shows, however, that red gemstones have not been the province of the female sex alone.

The great English warrior-king Henry V reportedly wore the 170-carat Black Prince’s Ruby — named for his great-uncle Edward, son of Edward III — into the Battle of Agincourt where it saved his life. (The gem was affixed to Harry’s helmet, staving off a blow from the Duke of Alençon’s ax.) Today the hen’s egg-sized stone commands pride of place on the Imperial State Crown, which resides in the Tower of London. (The queen wears it for the opening of Parliament.)

But is the Black Prince’s ruby real? Hardy describes it as an “ancient ruby,” because until the 18th century, jewelers were unable to differentiate among minerals. Today we know that what we thought were rubies, which are made of aluminum oxide, may really have been spinels, which are made of magnesium aluminum oxide. (Both contain trace impurities, including chromium, which

give them their color.)

The two stones refract light differently, too, so that the spinel shows the same color from all angles, while the ruby alternates orangey-red and pinkish-red.

Another difference, Hardy notes, is that while spinels can be purple, green or blue as well as pink and red, rubies are only some shade of red. (If a “ruby” is any other color, it is a sapphire, “but that is another story,” Hardy writes.)

This differentiation should not devalue the spinel — brought to the West along with other gemstones from Asia along the Silk Road — in the eye of the conGraphite and gouache design for a 1935 ruby and diamond Cartier temporary collector, she stresses. necklace. Drawing in graphite and gouache on tracing paper for a “Today, spinels are increasingly sought after ruby and diamond necklace commissioned from Cartier by Kailash for their beauty, durability and rarity, all qualiKumari Debi, maharani of Patna, for her husband, Sir Rajendra Narayan Singh Deo, maharajah of Patna. © Cartier. Courtesy ties that are highly valued by stone connoisseurs Cartier Archives. and jewelers.”

Indeed, part of what makes Hardy’s crimson coffee-table book so refreshing is her egalitarian approach to jewels. For her, “semi-precious” is a misnomer. “…All gemstones are precious so long as they display beauty, rarity and durability.”

Design of Hummingbird Aigrette, Chaumet, circa 1890. Design for a ruby and diamond bird-shaped Hummingbird Aigrette. Courtesy Collection Chaumet.

As for the notion that a

ruby should be only a certain color, she observes: “A colored gemstone should be chosen because it ‘speaks to you,’ not because it has been described in a particular way, such as ‘pigeon’s blood’ in the case of a ruby.”

A few quibbles about captions: Princess Grace — seen in an official 1959 portrait wearing a Cartier ruby and diamond diadem and diamond necklace and in a ruby and diamond tiara and necklace at Versailles in 1973 — was a Serene Highness, not a Royal Highness.

And the caption for a late-16th century portrait of Henry V, which shows him wearing several red gemstones, describes him incorrectly as the Black Prince.

We should also note that while the book dwells at length on Myanmar (the former Burma), from which many of the finest rubies come, and the political turmoil that led the United States to ban the importation of Burmese rubies for a time, its publication preceded the current crisis in which some 600,000 Muslim Rohingya have fled persecution in Buddhist Myanmar to neighboring Bangladesh.

Still, Hardy’s interdisciplinary approach — spanning art, science and history — and the stunning illustrations make this a gem — no, a ruby — of a book.

For more, visit thamesandhudsonusa.com.

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FEEDING THE BODY AND SOUL

BY DANIELLE RENDA

W

hen Truike Boekholt left for a month-long, teacher-training course in Rishikesh, India, she expected an enlightening experience.

The sacred city, which is tucked away in the scenic foothills of the Himalayas, adjacent to the holy Ganges River, is home to a host of temples and ashrams and has become internationally known for its yoga retreats. (One of these sites is The Beatles Ashram, now a museum where the Fab Four practiced transcendental meditation in the 1960s.)

But every day, as the Netherlands-born, Mamaroneck resident returned from her schooling, Rishikesh tugged at her heartstrings. The city’s street children would follow her, sometimes in droves, desperately begging for food and money behind tired, innocent eyes.

“Every day, I would see these little kids in the street walking around and they would just follow you,” she says. “I had my own kids at home and they were then 9 years old (twins, a boy and a girl, now age 14), and I saw my kids’ faces in their faces.”

This was some eight years ago. Fast-forward to the present and Boekholt is now celebrating the seventh year of Children of the Ganges, her Rishikesh-based nonprofit offering night schooling and warm meals to 44 children, six days a week.

“After graduating from the teacher training, I thought I needed to do something productive,” she says. “I thought, ‘I am the teacher, these are the students and this is the school.’”

The school, which is currently housed in the basement of a local hotel, holds classes from 4 to 7 p.m., Mondays through Saturdays, with occasional extracurricular activities offered on Sundays. The classes are split between two age groups — ages 5 to 10 and 11 to 16 — with males and females seated separately in the same classroom. They learn a number of subjects, from English, Hindi and math to yoga, kathak (classical Indian dance), art and nature. Several staff members, including a head teacher, an assistant teacher and a yoga instructor, lead the school.

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And before they leave for the day, every child is fed a nutritious dinner.

“One of the things I decided is that these children can’t go to bed hungry,” Boekholt says. “So, after class we feed them a warm meal. They eat so fast, without even talking. They always finish their plates, they’re always happy and they always want seconds.”

Plans for the school came together unexpectedly, but unfolded naturally. After meeting a street child named Aarti, Boekholt was shown a hand drawing of a lotus flower, which she offered to purchase from the young girl. Boekholt, who has worked at the United Nations International School as a music teacher for the past 13 years, purchased some small paint palettes and other supplies from a local bookstore, inviting more children to create. To help them better concentrate on their work, she offered them meals at a local restaurant.

“If you’re hungry, how can you even do anything?” Boekholt says.

She brought these drawings — which were made using “holy water” from the Ganges River — with her to the United States. Shortly after, she spoke with a neighbor, who happened to be

Children of the Ganges. Courtesy Truike Boekholt.

a graphic designer and offered to make greeting cards using the children’s drawings. Boekholt sold the cards to friends, family and colleagues and, soon enough, raised some $2,000, which she brought to India the following year, along with two book-filled suitcases.

The school has been growing ever since.

As Children of the Ganges is nearing the end of its lease in the hotel, Boekholt hopes to create a new space. With the help of volunteers, she is working to design a one- to two-room bottle school, an eco-friendly building made using recycled plastic bottles that are then stuffed with garbage as a substitute for bricks. The school, which she plans to open in March 2019, is a cost-effective dream that will help clean the community, but with 3,000 to 4,000 densely packed bottles required for a single room, it will prove labor intensive.

“One bottle can take up to an hour to fill,” she says. “It has to be sturdy.”

To raise funds for her nonprofit, Boekholt continues to sell the art cards, along with other Indian-made products. She holds annual service retreats, where volunteers can travel to Rishikesh to help with the school’s day-to-day affairs.

March 3, she’s holding her second benefit at Tovami Yoga in Mamaroneck, where guests can practice yoga, browse an Indian bazaar and color each other with vibrant powder in honor of India’s Holi festival.

Known as the “festival of colors,” it is traditionally held March 2 to celebrate new beginnings. The suggested donation is $40. (And it’s well worth it, as one student’s daily meal costs just 55 cents, according to Boekholt.)

Children of the Ganges is a challenge — especially with plans underway for the construction of the new school — but for Boekholt, the return is invaluable.

“It feels like something I’m supposed to do,” she says. “We only have a limited amount of time, right? And so, I feel like I did something useful. And the kids’ smiles are just priceless.”

For more on Children of the Ganges, including opportunities to donate and volunteer, visit childrenoftheganges.com. To donate to the bottle school, visit gofundme.com/ bottleschoolCofG. To register for the event hosted by Tovami Yoga, visit tovamiyoga.com.

WHAT'S COLLECTIBLE?

A living legend

BY JENNY PITMAN

Lino Tagliapietra, “Dinosaur,” sold for $31,250 (estimate: $15,000-$20,000).

Photographs courtesy Rago Arts and Auction.

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IN THE WORLD OF CONTEMPORARY ART GLASS — WITHOUT DOUBT ONE OF THE AUCTION INDUSTRY’S HOTTEST MARKETS — IT IS DALE CHIHULY’S NAME THAT HAS THE GREATEST STAR POWER AND COMMERCIAL SUCCESS. CHIHULY’S RECENT BLOCKBUSTER SHOW AT THE NEW YORK BOTANICAL GARDEN IS A TESTAMENT TO THIS ARTIST’S POPULARITY. BUT IT IS LINO TAGLIAPIETRA WHO IS REGARDED AS THE FIELD’S ULTIMATE LUMINARY AND A LIVING LEGEND — AND HE'S STILL DESIGNING AND CREATING GLASS AT AGE 83.

Chihuly has described Tagliapietra as “perhaps the world’s greatest living glassblower.” Tagliapietra’s technical prowess is matched by his talent for design and innovative techniques. Above all, Tagliapietra is revered within the Studio Glass community for his collaborative approach. By sharing his knowledge and techniques with fellow glassmakers, he broke with the tradition of secrecy that had surrounded Italian glassmaking for centuries and propelled forward the Ameri-

tions and his glasswork has been the subject of can Studio Glass movement. numerous exhibitions and monographs. LocalTagliapietra was born in 1934 on one of the isly, Tagliapietra’s work can be seen at the Seven lands surrounding Murano — about a mile north Bridges Foundation in Greenwich, which has an of Venice — and left school around age 10 to learn extraordinary collection of modern glass. the glassmaking trade. By his early 20s, he had risTagliapietra’s pieces are now also well-esen to the most accomplished level of glassblowing tablished in the secondary market — where his — maestro — and then spent his career working for works sell at auction at prices that range from a number of Murano factories. Traditionally, they $1,000 to more than $40,000. According to Susharply demarcated the role of glassblower and zanne Perrault, Rago Auctions’ contemporary designer. But Tagliapietra began blurring these glass specialist, Tagliapietra’s early works are lines by developing his own designs, many of the most affordable, because as editions they which were put into production. While traditionare made in multiples and don't feature the ally only the factory name appeared on a work, extraordinarily complex techniques and coldTagliapietra began to sign his own name on his work found in later pieces. For example, the work late in his career.

“Oggetti” series of brightly colored eggs, the Tagliapietra's collaboration with other design“Pueblo” series inspired by Native American ers and glassblowers, like Marina Angelin and pottery and the “Rainbow” series can sell at Chihuly, and his association with the newly established Pilchuck Glass School in Stanwood, Washington, transformed his own work. By the mid-1990s, when Tagliapietra ceased collaborating with others to concentrate on his own work, he became bolder in his technique and his realization of color and form. The results were astonishing.

With the help of his assistants, Tagliapietra continues to make glass himself, often making decisions about the piece in front of the furnace. He rarely uses premade colors, instead relying on old recipes. With his decades of experience, he manipulates the glass to incorporate different patterns and colors, from filigree to painter’s brushstrokes.

Some pieces are further embellished after the glass has cooled with cold-work, which encompasses engraving and cutting to add texture to the vessels and results in different effects on the glass’s reflection. For example, battuto imitates hammered metal and inciso creates slender grooves.

Today, most major institutions have acquired examples of TaLino Tagliapietra and Marina Angelin, “Egg,” sold for $1,125 gliapietra’s work for their collec(estimate: $500-$700).

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Lino Tagliapietra, “Flying Boat,” sold for $40,625 (estimate: $8,000-$12,000).

auction for around $1,000.

Later works, representing Tagliapietra’s most mature period, are highly coveted and often bring prices in the tens of thousands.

The colorful “Flying Boats” series, with pieces more than 5 feet in length, is embellished with complex canes and cutting, and the resulting forms have a f loating, ethereal quality. The “Dinosaur” series, so named for its oversized shape and elongated neck, beautifully evokes

these extinct creatures. The “Batman” series uses multicolored glass canes and cold-working to create a dense opaque vessel evoking a reptile’s scaly skin.

Aside from edition size and the sophisticated nature of later work, what other factors affect the value of Tagliapietra’s work at auction? According to Perrault, signed pieces will garner a slight premium over unsigned works. But above all, the condition of the piece is the key factor. While

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glass artists are far more forgiving of inclusions in the making, such as a bubble, or other minor damage, collectors are adamant that the work be free of these imperfections and will pay a premium for glasswork that is devoid of any nicks and scratches.

For further reading, see Susanne K. Frantz’s, “Lino Tagliapietra: In Retrospect” (2008).

For more, contact Jenny Pitman at jenny@ragoarts.com or 917-745-2730.

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WANDERS

THE LURE OF CONTINENTAL CHRISTMAS MARKETS

BY BARBARA BARTON SLOANE

T

he Christmas market has become a staple of the holiday season. Think holiday markets at Grand Central Terminal and Bryant Park in Manhattan — the latter with its own skating rink.

But the idea of these markets dates from medieval Europe. Recently, I had the opportunity to step back in time, as it were, and experience a few of them on a Uniworld River Cruise along the Rhine River, making ports-ofcall in Cologne, Germany; Strasbourg, France; and Basel, Switzerland.

We first visited Cologne, a city of a million residents boasting world-renowned dining and no less than 42 museums. Germany’s fourth city is known for a welcoming attitude that invites you in for a drink and its cathedral, a UNESCO World Heritage Site. The city’s market stalls resemble small Alpine huts and the square on the Rudolfplatz had revelers costumed as Grimm’s fantastical fairies. In Koblenz, I sampled, among the many German goodies, stollen and, naturally, aromatic glühwein (mulled wine). Yes, they go very well together.

The city of Rüdesheim am Rhein, another UNESCO Heritage site, has a medieval feel, even though it dates from Roman times. Among its 120 Christmas stalls, 12 countries are represented, including far-flung Mongolia. Then it was on to Heidelberg, home of Germany’s oldest university, and romantic reveries of “The Student Prince,” Sigmund Romberg’s sparkling operetta.

There was an open-air ice rink with skaters gliding by as carolers in picturesque Victorian outfits serenaded visitors, making the scene for me a winter wonderland.

In a small corner of France sits Strasbourg, a UNESCO site in its entirety, with markets that have been in existence since the Middle Ages. I will remember Strasbourg for its burnished holiday glow

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and its food offerings, such as a warm tarte flambée consisting of pastry covered with cream, onions and bacon pieces — every bit as good as it sounds — and some hearty (you guessed it) glühwein.

Last stop — Basel, Switzerland. A small city, Basel is grand in many ways. The Kunstmuseum Basel contains the most important art collection in the country while the city is also home to Art Basel, the international fair. The towering fir tree in the town center cast its shimmering spell over the whole square. The Old Town Christmas markets are thought to be the prettiest, most significant in Switzerland and the waffles smothered mit schlag were not bad either.

Before departing Basel, you must visit Les Trois Rois, the city’s grand hotel. Flanking the door were two dazzling giant Christmas trees, while the reception area gleamed Christmas.

What more could I want? Perhaps a glass of bubbly and a seat on a plush velvet sofa in the hotel’s intimate, beguiling bar — a fitting end to my Uniworld European holiday dream excursion.

For more, visit uniworld.com and lestroisrois.com.

Clockwise from above, the city of Basel on the Rhine River; Les Trois Rois’ bar area; and ruins of Heidelberg Castle. Images courtesy Sloane Travel Photography.

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WANDERS

BORN TO BE ALPENWILD

BY DEBBI K. KICKHAM

E

veryone knows that France and Italy are incredible foodie destinations, but don’t forget Switzerland.

Switzerland is a food paradise, especially for chocolate and cheese, as Greg Witt enjoys demonstrating. For 30 years, Witt has been the owner of Alpenwild, a first-class travel company he founded to let you have your cake and eat it, too. You will hike 3 to 5 miles daily in the Alps and then enjoy a guilt-free gourmet dinner, plus accommodations at five-star hotels, not to mention a few spa treatments and incredible culinary demonstrations and experiences.

I just completed a highlights tour that showcased the best that Alpenwild offers, and it was a treat from day one. But then, each tour vividly brings the Alps to life, highlighting unrivaled Alpine scenery, rural gourmet gastronomy and one-of-a-kind experiences.

Spoiler alert: Yes, you will be spoiled. Witt — the company’s self-styled “adventurer in chief,”

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is a prince of a man — kind and helpful to a fault, taking care of your every need, from providing two European adapters for your phone and computer, to telling you the best place to buy a watch (and escorting you there). His wife, Elaine, who accompanied us, is a walking encyclopedia of all-things-Swiss and is refreshingly enthusiastic about everything from foraging for truffles (which we did, more on that in a minute), to telling you all you need to know about Swiss culture. (For example, the law-abiding Swiss would not dream of trying to use public transportation without purchasing a ticket.)

Both Greg and Elaine are filled with enthusiasm for mountainous places. (They’re transplanted Americans who live much of the year in Utah, where Greg remains an avid climber and believer in the sound in body, sound in mind approach to life.) So it’s not surprising that Alpenwild attracts an affluent demographic — mostly Shaving truffles to make truffle butter – yum! doctors, lawyers and CEOs who want a personadded a hazelnut to the chocolate shell Läderach alized Swiss trip that provides remarkable food provided, then we used pastry bags to fill it with experiences, lots of exercise and first-class hotels praline. We garnished our creations with green and restaurants. marzipan, even making the little spikes that apOn our highlights trip, we went foraging for pear on the chestnut. It was delicious — and probtruffles in the forest — specifically in the “trufably doubly wonderful, as I made it myself. fle capital of the world,” the forest of Bonvillars.

Another great advantage to Alpenwild is that This was a complete delight and a thrill. We had the accommodations and restaurants are toptwo guides who brought their beloved dog (one notch. In Gstaad, for example — that haven of the of the Lagotto Romagnolo breed), and we all rich and famous — we stayed at Le Grand Bellevue, watched in amazement as she sniffed out truffles a five-star hotel. The owner and manager, Daniel in five different places in woods that are known Koester, (a Prince William lookalike), showed for their lime-rich soil. Later, we went to a kitchus all around this fabulous property, which inen and shaved down the truffles to make truffle stead of being boring and stuffy, has an edge to butter, which we enjoyed on crusty bread. It was it. (Cue the giant camel in the lobby.) “We aim to a wow moment. be provocative,” said Koester (who told us how We also experienced sensational chocolate the hotel gloriously fulfilled a guest’s request for a tastings from different top-notch chocolate makpygmy goat, which he brought home to Italy). ers. (I learned that one of the reasons Swiss chocLater, we all received excellent first-rate masolate is so terrific is that the cows eat all kinds of sages in the sublime spa. My sciatica was acting vegetation, including violets and black vanilla up, and my masseuse gently caressed me, then inorchids and that this is carried into their special structed me to sit later in the infrared sauna. The milk, which goes into the chocolate.) At the conpain completely went away. The spa also features fectioner Läderach, for example, we were first a salt inhalation grotto, ice fountain, bubbling impressed with the amazing display of all kinds footbaths and 11 treatment rooms. of exquisite chocolates. Included were mini chocTrust me: One Alpenwild tour is not enough. olate shoes in homage to Charlie Chaplin, a resiPut me down for that goat’s milk bath in Gstaad dent of neighboring Corsier-sur-Vevey for more next time around. than 30 years. (The museum devoted to him there For more, visit Alpenwild.com. And for more is a must-see.) We donned aprons and toques and on Debbi, visit glamorousglobetrotter.com and set out to make chocolate “chestnuts.” First, we marketingauthor.com.

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Rival relationships rock the impassioned worlds of swimming and tennis.

A quarterback's search for identity amid the brutal beauty of the NFL

"Water Music" and "The Penalty for Holding" are the first two novels in Georgette Gouveia's book series "The Games Men Play." It's also the name of her blog exploring sports, culture and sex.

thegamesmenplay.com

WANDERS

THE THRILL OF THE HOLIDAY MARKET HUNT

BY JEREMY WAYNE

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ho doesn’t love a market? The thrill of the hunt, the clinching of the deal, the pleasure of finding something unusual, special or perhaps even unique. Then, of course, there’s the small sense of satisfaction at having escaped, at least for once, the mind-numbing sameness of the mall. As if all this weren’t enough, holiday markets create a special wonder, a sense of magic of their own.

Some of my favorite holiday markets include Georgetown, Colorado, which celebrates yuletide as it was 100 years ago (think horse-drawn wagons and carol singers in period clothing); and the Great Dickens Christmas Fair, in Daly City, California, a riotous step back in time to Victorian London, with lamplit alleys, rowdy taverns, music halls, stalls and fun by the barrel-load.

If you find yourself in the Midwest, meanwhile, don’t miss Cincinnati’s Cincideustch Christkindlmarkt (and try saying that after a couple of glasses of glühwein). As befits the great Germanic city on the Ohio River, Cincy’s holiday market takes its inspiration from the Germany of the Middle Ages, where traditional Christmas markets arose. There are Hansel and Gretel storefronts, young boys in lederhosen, foaming steins of beer, fireworks displays, a skating rink, traditional German foods and gifts — of course — and a great time had by all.

But wonderful as our homegrown markets undoubtedly are — and call me biased, why don’t you — for me nothing beats the frisson of excitement I experience this time of year in some of the great street markets of Europe. Forget Disney. If you find yourself across the pond in December (fares are low, low, low in the first half of the month and the Euro’s as weak as the proverbial newborn kitten), the sparkly street markets, thrumming with life by day and shimmery kaleidoscopes of light by night, are imbued with a special kind of magic.

Cannes, on the French Riviera, between Nice and St. Tropez, may be known for its May film festival and its jet-setty summer beach life, but take it

InterContinental Carlton Cannes Hotel. Courtesy IHG.

from me, December through March is the time to visit this jewel of the Mediterranean. The streets are quiet, restaurants are pleased to see you, the sun shines and the air is often balmy. Indeed, if there is a more beautiful site in this world than a wintry sun rising over Île Sainte-Marguerite or setting in a vermillion sky over the Gulf of La Napoule as seen from your suite at the Intercontinental Carlton Cannes Hotel — still the loveliest hotel in Cannes and a positive bargain in the winter months — then somebody please tell me where to find it.

But I digress, because we’re talking about markets and Cannes has a magical December one (in addition to its glorious daily produce market), set at the foot of the old town, across from the yacht harbor and its Palais des Festivals. Large it is not — tiny would be a better word — but charming it is in spades, with the loveliest little artifacts and ceramics and upscale tchotchkes — if that is not a contradiction in terms — you ever did see.

While nights may be silent in Cannes in December, by contrast half a million visitors flock to Montreux on Lake Geneva for its Marché de Noël, Switzerland’s most fabulous Christmas market.

Beautiful handmade crafts, including striking avant-garde jewelry and the chicest winter-wear, jostle for market space with wonderful edibles and comestibles, the spirit and the gut warmed with lashings of the local vin chaud, or mulled wine.

Travel an hour along the lake and you come to Geneva itself, my great unsung city of Europe, with its crisp, cold winter days, sunny skies of electric blue and its iconic Jet d’Eau (fountain) brought into sharp relief against the achingly lovely backdrop of Mont Blanc. And on the rue Mont Blanc, Geneva has a small winter market of its own, where the designer watches and timepieces at knock-down prices can make a perfect Hanukkah or Christmas gift and may well be as desirable as the Tissots and Baume et Merciers on the swanky Rue de Rhône across the bridge. Shop at the market, incidentally, and with what you save you can splurge on La Réserve, the city’s finest hotel (and this in a city not short of good hotels).

This being Switzerland, the 102-room Jacques Garcia-designed La Réserve is big on health and beauty, with a dazzling Nescens Spa, an all-white oasis, complete with indoor pool, sauna and ham-

Holiday Market in Prešeren Square, Ljubljana.

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mam, and – should the fancy take you – a fleet of personal trainers. The icing on the cake is an ice rink which seems to float on air, overlooking Lake Geneva, at its beautiful best on a star-filled black December night. Talk about a winter pick-me-up.

Want to know Europe’s best-kept secret? Across the neck of Italy, nudging the Julian Alps, lies Slovenia, one of the continent’s most beautiful countries.

Its capital, Ljubljana (Loob-li-AH-na), is beyond ravishing, with its juxtaposition of Roman, Baroque and Vienna Secession architecture. What’s more, Ljubljana has what I’d say is one of Europe’s top half-dozen winter markets, in essence a winter fair that takes up most of the city center, along with a mile or so of ice skating in stunning Zvezda Park.

Opened in August of this year, the new InterContinental is sympathetic in design and brimming with good taste – not only the best hotel address in the city but the best hotel for 100 miles in any direction. Put Ljubljana on your bucket list right now and get there while the going’s good. Wonderful as the new InterConti is – because of it, in fact - the crowds will come, and you want always to be ahead of the curve.

Happy shopping, happy holidays and Happy New Year.

B Bar at InterContinental Ljubljana. Courtesy IHG.

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WONDERFUL DINING

Oversize centerpieces accent Sergio’s sleek dining room.

UPSCALE ITALIAN AT SERGIO’S STORY AND PHOTOGRAPHS

BY ALEESIA FORNI

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s the saying goes, if at first you don’t succeed, try, try again.

That adage holds especially true if your quest involves an evening at the ever-popular Sergio’s Ristorante in downtown Pelham.

After hearing multiple rave reviews of the eatery, my fiancé, John, and I had planned to visit Sergio’s on a recent Saturday evening. With no definite plans or timetables, I figured I’d give the restaurant a call during the early afternoon and plan our night around its availabilities.

In hindsight, this may not have been the best

idea. The affable gentleman who answered my call regretted to inform me that, unfortunately, they were booked solid for the rest of the evening.

Disheartened but not deterred, I immediately made a reservation for the next evening.

With much better luck, we bundled up and headed to Sergio’s on a chilly fall night.

The restaurant itself is warm, inviting and not at all stuffy, something that can be credited both to the exceptionally friendly service and the sleek, striking decór. White tablecloths and hanging industrial fixtures are accented by black-and-white photographs of some of Italy’s most treasured landmarks — The Galleria Vittorio Emanuele II,

Tuna tartare is served with avocado and crispy chips.

The Colosseum, The Leaning Tower of Pisa. Gorgeous white lights hang down from window sills that line the dining room, while a trio of oversize centerpieces with red, orange and green florals add splashes of fall color. A spiraling iron staircase leads to a second-floor, 70-seat private dining space.

We took our seat near a large wooden wine rack, affording us a view of fellow diners who were an eclectic mix of families with small children, couples on a date night and a group of friends celebrating a birthday. At the crowded bar area, patrons stood around those who were seated, all chatting while taking in Sunday night football.

A nutty Napoleon dessert was a highlight of the evening.

Taking advantage of what is the final night of Hudson Valley Restaurant Week, I chose from the three-course menu and started with tuna tartare.

Topped with avocado and a zesty citrus dressing, this was a treat for the taste buds; a pair of crisp chips served alongside the dish helped us polish off the small plate.

A truly hulking slab of prime rib was served alongside broccoli rabe in an entrée we selected from the evening’s list of specials. While the meat was juicy and expertly cooked, a starch would have been a welcome addition for soaking up the meat’s delectable juices.

Again from the Restaurant Week menu, I opted for chicken scarpariello, which was served with thin slices of sausage and an assortment of vegetables in a garlic, lemon and white wine sauce.

Bits of jalapeño added a heated kick, and I found myself reaching for my water at regular intervals.

When perusing my dessert options, I was pleased to see the inclusion of the Napoleon — something recommended by WAG’s own editor-in-chief, Georgette Gouveia, who raved about this nutty yet creamy twist on a classic.

Our waiter halved the generous portion of the dessert, splitting it between my fiancé and me.

John — who has accompanied me on countless dinners out, has as small of a sweet tooth as mine is large, and rarely raves about a dessert. But he found himself reaching for bites of my half after he’d finished his own.

We sampled other standout desserts, including tiramisu, topped with a trio of berries and served alongside a pumpkin spice gelato that was perfect

Chicken scarpariello with sausage and a mix of vegetables.

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Three scoops of blood orange sorbet are topped with coconut flakes.

for the chilly evening. Scoops of blood orange sorbet were pleasantly tart and topped with coconut flakes.

In a darkened dining room on a bustling evening, it’s difficult to be discreet when taking photos that elicit an overwhelming flash. I attempted to stand in corners, circling the perimeter, snapping photos of the interior and giving semi-apologetic smiles to any diner who looked my way.

I was soon approached by the eatery’s manager, who was nothing short of hospitable and offered to show me the “money shot.”

“Follow me,” he told me with an almost cunning smile.

He led me to the front of the restaurant and positioned me in a spot at the host’s station. I snapped away, chatted for a bit and thanked him for his time before returning to my seat.

It occurred to me later that he may have misconstrued my many photos from multiple angles as my having trouble finding a suitable vantage point. In reality, the opposite is true.

At Sergio’s, every spot is a “money shot” and I’m so glad that I tried, tried again.

For more, visit sergiosofpelham.com.

Restaurant

Bar

Music Lounge

Brother Vics Music Lounge 920 Oakridge Commons, South Salem, NY 110

WAGMAG.COM

DECEMBER 2017

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914.704.VICS (8427)

Proprietor, Bobby Epstein of the legendary Muscoot Tavern in Katonah, invites you to experience his newest restaurant—

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Gather • Eat • Drink.

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WINE & DINE

‘COME AS A GUEST, LEAVE AS A FRIEND’ IN IBERIA’S WINE REGIONS

BY DOUG PAULDING Pedro Araujo, owner of Ameal winery in Portugal, makes great wine and has luxurious rooms to rent on his country estate.

T

his column is usually about wine and spirits. I often focus on a producer, a region or maybe a type of grape or spirit. Today, however, let’s take a trip together to an exotic land and talk of castles, ancient monasteries, mountains, cathedrals, food, history — and wine. I recently returned from a wonderful and eye-opening trip to the west coast of the Iberian Peninsula, first exploring the Galicia region in the northwest corner of Spain. We then crossed the Miño River, separating Spain and northern Portugal, and experienced the flavors of Portugal — north, central and south. Put this destination at the top of your short list for your next vacation, whether it be family-style or romantic, and immerse yourself in an experiential taste of history and culture — and wine. It’s more affordable than you think.

Virtually anywhere you look is gorgeous countryside or bustling and historical city centers with the ocean never being far away. Galicia has five different Denomination of Origins (DOs) for its wine production. Rias Baixas is a region known for lovely white wines made from 100 percent Albariño grapes. This wine pairs perfectly with virtually any seafood dish. There are three different UNESCO World Heritage sites in the region, all well worth a visit, including the Tower of Hercules in Coruña.

It is the only fully preserved Roman navigational lighthouse. Built in the first century, it is still in use today.

Santiago de Compostela, the capital of Galicia and another UNESCO site, is said to be the burial site of St. James the Greater, a disciple of Jesus. A Romanesque cathedral to the martyr is now the culmination of pilgrimage trails originating in France, Germany, Spain and Portugal. The faithful believe a pilgrimage to the shrine is a path to Heaven’s

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gates. To explore the idea of the spiritual quest, we spent a night in Parador de Santo Estevo, a former monastery dating from the sixth and seventh centuries and now a luxury hotel in Ourense, Spain.

As we moved southward, we entered the Ribeira Sacra DO and found white and red wine production. There we visited the winery Abadía da Cova, with reds made predominantly from Mencia and Garnacha grapes. The setting is among the most stunningly beautiful I have seen anywhere. The terrain is wild, looking out over a horseshoe-shaped river bend 1,000 feet below, with such steep topography that every row of vines needs its own retaining wall. The stonework alone must have taken decades of harvest just to cover the cost, and I can only imagine how impossible harvest time is every year. But Abadía makes beautifully structured, elegant wines worth seeking.

A bit further south overlooking the Miño River, we tasted through the wines of Viña Costeira, a major producer and wine cooperative spanning two Dos — the Ribeiro and the Valdeorras. This modern, high-tech winery has hundreds of partners and hundreds of growers. The wines are well-made, worthy and easily affordable.

Then we crossed the river into the Viño Verde region of northern Portugal. All of the Viño Verde wines we tried were lovely expressions of the local grapes. As I’ve written before in this column, the spritzy Viño Verdes of the past are being replaced with delicious, elegant wines capable of aging. Portugal has recently established a wonderful lodging environment that will amaze anyone. The Solares de Portugal is a collection of more than 100 historical estates, country homes and farmhouses throughout the country, many dating back hundreds of years, with rooms for rent that have been inspected and certified as architecturally, historically and luxuriously interesting. Instead of staying

in a hotel, you stay in a living, breathing environment. One owner told us, “You come as a guest, you leave as a friend.”

We dined with a count and his wife at Paco de Calheiros, tasted their wines, toured their manor and learned about the evolution of the area through the generations. We visited Quinta do Ameal, a hidden gem of a wine-producing property owned by Pedro Araujo. The five meticulous, tastefully appointed guestrooms opened onto the country estate, where river sports, hiking and biking are regular pursuits. And, of course, the sound, organic Ameal wines are on the table. As Pedro told me, “Wine must represent a sense of place. We make our wines in the vineyard and not in the cellar. By focusing on the development of the fruit, making the wine is simple.” These white wines are natural and delicious, showing balanced citrus pucker with a full mouthfeel. Casa de Sezim, another Solares property, dates from 1376 and is home to papered medieval rooms that have become part of a pilgrimage for historical-wallpaper enthusiasts.

At any of these, the owners live onsite, so dining is high quality and likely to be served family-style.

Instead of learning from the hotel bartender, you are likely to get an in-depth lesson of the region from the proprietor and taste the wines from the estate. Portugal is home to 115 UNESCO sites, scattered all over the country. And the best part — affordability. Rooms are available for somewhere between $125 and $170 per night. Add accessibility. To drive from the top of Spain to the southern edge of Portugal takes about eight hours. Any visit to the western coast of the Iberian Peninsula is a taste and experience of centuries of history. Find out what life was like with all the luxurious perks of what life can be.

Write me at doug@dougpaulding.com.

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WHETTING THE APPETITE

LEMONY, LIGHT AND LUSCIOUS

BY JACQUELINE RUBY The month of December is full of the madness of holiday preparations.

Whether it is shopping, cooking or going to parties, you will no doubt be laden with expectations and lots of food. This recipe is festive and light. It will take no time at all to prepare, so make two for those holiday crunch times.

For more, contact the Saucy Realtor at jacquelineruby@hotmail.com.

Tableware courtesy Casafina.

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VODKA-INFUSED MEYER LEMON POUND CAKE INGREDIENTS: • 1 box Krusteaz Meyer Lemon Pound Cake Mix (package includes Lemon Glaze Mix) • 3 tablespoons lemon zest • 4 tablespoons lemon juice • 2 tablespoons Meyer Lemon vodka • 1/3 cup ground walnuts • 3/4 cup water • 10 tablespoons melted butter

DIRECTIONS: 1. Heat oven to 350 degrees.

2. Add 3/4 cup water and melted butter to cake mix and stir.

3. Add 2 tablespoons lemon zest, nuts, lemon juice and vodka.

4. Mix and spoon batter into a pound cake mold pan.

5. Bake approximately 45 minutes, or until toothpick inserted in center of cake comes out clean.

6. Cool 5 minutes and remove from pan.

7. For glaze, combine 1 pouch of glaze mix, 2 tablespoons of lemon juice and 1 tablespoon of zest.

8. Pour over cake.

9. Serve with fresh berries.

G

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Stop in and experience the charm of this historic eatery, a neighborhood favorite since the Roaring ‘20s! Enjoy our cozy tavern where it’s always lively and cheerful or relax on our patio overlooking our horseshoe and bocce ball courts.

Live music on Saturdays and some Fridays On Sundays, enjoy outdoor live music from 4 to 8:30 Happy Hour Daily from 4-6 and again from 9-11 on Thurs, Fri and Saturday nights.

105 Somerstown Turnpike, Katonah, NY (Corner of Rt. 100 and Rt. 35) www.muscoottavern.com 914 • 232 • 2800

WHERE ARE THEY NOW?

CHIARA BONI’S COMFORTABLE LUXURY

BY DANIELLE RENDA PHOTOGRAPH BY BOB ROZYCKI Chiara Boni, fourth from left, with Neiman Marcus Westchester models.

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Models wearing Chiara Boni’s seasonal collection strutted down the runway to the beat of Eurythmics’ “Sweet Dreams” — appropriately so.

Each garment proved more stunning than the next.

It was a festive moment at Neiman Marcus Westchester, capturing the essence of the Italian fashion designer’s brand, La Petite Robe, which WAG first covered in the June 2016 issue about global travel.

Boni is still traveling, wheeling a suitcase filled with clothes that boast confidence, comfort and a hint — or a few — of sexiness.

Her use of jersey, which has become a signature of her brand, was chosen with the traveling woman in mind — as well as today’s modern, do-it-all diva.

Selected to promote feel-good vibes through easy fit, the material is a kind of elegant second skin.

“Life is so complicated,” Boni says. “I try to make it a little easier.”

Indeed, the no-nonsense jersey is machine — washable, breathable and wrinkle-free, for a trusted — and uncompromisingly alluring, grab-and-go option. This way, the wearer can focus on her dazzling plans with sure conviction that she looks her best.

“You know it’s special when you have a customer say, ‘These dresses changed my life,’” says Jeff O’Geary, vice president and general manager of Neiman Marcus Westchester, who opened the fashion show.

No wonder Boni’s high-comfort, low-mainte-

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nance styles have hugged the figures of everyone from Emily Ratajkowski and Paris Hilton to Lisa Vanderpump, Niecy Nash, Oprah Winfrey and first lady Melania Trump.

New this season are such wow factors as largerthan-life bows, off-the-shoulder sass, pops of luxurious color, bold bell sleeves, sultry sweetheart necklines, mesh motifs and zipper accents. Boni incorporates a touch of unexpected color into the inset of sleeves for an interesting, eye-catching moment, while peplum styles create flattering silhouettes, camouflaging a common problem area (the hips, hips, hooray).

Aside from classic black — Boni’s personal favorite — colors include cobalt blue, olive green, fuchsia and scarlet orange, which are all incorporated into dresses for both work and play as well as sleek jumpsuits.

Boni was the full embodiment of her clothing in action, sporting a beautiful floor-length black jumpsuit — she prefers a monochromatic look to prints — with translucent sleeves that molded her arms. She jazzed up the solid black with chunky jewelry on her wrists, a personal twist.

“My philosophy is that a dress has to go over a woman,” Boni explains. “So the dress doesn’t have to be too much, otherwise you aren’t able to see the woman inside…There can’t be a dress where you only see the garment walking and you can’t see the woman inside.”

Because, for Boni, the attention should always be on the woman, first and foremost — but clothes should be a close second.

For more, visit chiaraboni.com or neimanmarcus.com.

WEAR

A HAIRDRESSER DISPENSING MORE THAN A GOOD CUT STORY AND PHOTOGRAPH

BY BRIAN TOOHEY

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hen I was told that this month’s issue was about philanthropy and giving, I paused to consider what that would mean for me.

I am not a philanthropist, but I can relate to the act of giving and I learned some valuable lessons in the act of giving a kindness to someone in need.

It was a day in August some years ago in the middle of a heatwave at lunchtime in midtown Manhattan. The streets were teeming with people, including a man leaning against the subway entrance without shoes on his feet or a shirt to cover his back. He was covered in grime and the sweat

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Style with movement.

was pouring from his body as he panted for air. He was barely conscious.

I stopped and watched as people passed by.

Some looked at him with disgust and others with pity. I realized there I was standing in front of a deli.

I don’t know what came over me, but suddenly I was filled with joy as I went inside and ordered a tuna sandwich and a bottle of water. I went out to him. I knelt down and put the bag with the sandwich at his side.

His eyes were closed and I feared he was expiring before my eyes, so I opened the bottle of water to put it to his lips and, as I did, his eyes opened. The gesture struck me like lightning. It was the purest spirit of love, shaking me to the core. As I walked away, I thought how so many of us are seeking a knowledge of something higher than ourselves, perhaps God or love itself, and there it was hiding in plain sight disguised as a derelict.

Now that for me was a powerful experience. But there are many subtle ways that we care for each other every day.

On a lighter note, it was a Monday morning when I knew the cold I had caught over the weekend would prevent me from keeping an appointment with a loyal client driving in from Albany. I called to tell her I probably couldn’t make it into the city for her appointment. She said, “Brian, I am already booked into my room at The Peninsula,” and then she was on her way to Washing-

ton for important meetings. She added, “Brian, I believe in miracles, so let’s see how you feel in the morning.”

Well, she was right. The morning came and I was feeling better. I understood this was important to her and was happy to let her know I was on my way.

When I arrived at the salon she was already shampooed. We were both quite happy that I had made it in. The point of the story is this: As I was cutting her hair, a little trick came to mind that I had forgotten for a long time that the master stylist Paul Mitchell taught me when I was a boy. It made the work better and easier and, at the end, it was probably the best haircut I had ever given her. But I got back more than I gave. At the close of our visit, we took many pictures and had so much fun enjoying our result. I am sure her meetings went well.

When I design a haircut, the shape and balance of the style is always dictated by what I see in the mirror. Your face and expression of personality are the starting points, but in the end it is how I see the hair moving as you go through the day. Let me say it this way: I will notice a woman at the checkout counter in the market looking closer into her bag for her wallet as she raises her head and sweeps her hand through her hair. In that moment of movement, a good haircut expresses so much loveliness.

Visit Brian at Warren Tricomi Salon, 1 E. Putnam Ave., Greenwich. To book an appointment with him, call 212-262-8899.

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WELL are working toward, but it may not be present every day. Such phrases as “I’m tired” and “It takes too much time” sometime try to take over.

Now there is a difference between being utterly consumed by something and still having a life. By no means am I advocating isolating yourself. You should have fun and be social. However, keep in mind the old adage: “Someone is always working when you’re not.” And it is those individuals working in a routine consistently, not just sometimes or most of the time, who are the ones skyrocketing.

BEND IT LIKE LINCOLN

BY GIOVANNI ROSELLI

“If you’re relentless, there is no half-way, no could or should or maybe. Don’t tell me the glass is half-full or half-empty. You either have something in that glass or you don’t. Decide. Commit. Act. Succeed. Repeat.”

—Tim S. Grover, “Relentless.”

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What attributes do successful people have in common?

They are relentless. They are consistent. They are determined. They are intensely focused. They persevere. Do you possess these qualities?

ARE YOU RELENTLESS? Do you want to improve? Are you wondering how to climb the ladder in your chosen profession?

When looking at those who have excelled at the highest level, there are obvious common themes.

• They’ve all dedicated immense time, effort and energy to their craft.

• They’ve all been knocked down and gotten back up.

• They’ve all shown tremendous focus on their given tasks.

• They’ve all made mistakes and learned from them.

CONSISTENCY A friend once told me, “Discipline means doing what you don’t want to do when you don’t want to do it.” Sure, there should be passion for what you

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DETERMINATION/PERSISTENCE If you perform a task and it doesn’t go as planned, do you figure out what went wrong and correct it for next time? If you reach out to someone and he or she doesn’t respond, is that the end of it? This is when you must go beyond what you are already doing to get the outcome you desire.

This is more than not taking “no” for an answer. This is about finding out why the “no” was given as an answer and figuring out how to turn it into a “yes.”

INTENSE FOCUS When I say intense focus, I’m talking about laser focus: “I am going to give this my all, my absolute best. My power and energy are committed to this project.”

There’s a good chance you will get to the point where people around you may think that you’re too intense and too consumed. They probably don’t understand what it takes to breakout and thrive.

If I stopped every time someone told me to “calm down,” I wouldn’t have achieved nearly anything that I’ve accomplished in my life thus far.

PERSEVERANCE If you want an example of perseverance then look no further than our 16th president, Abraham Lincoln.

Here is a rundown of some of the obstacles he encountered in his life: 1816: His family was forced out of their home. He worked to support them.

1818: His mother died.

1831: Failed in business.

1832: Ran for state legislature and lost.

1832: Also lost his job. Wanted to go to law school but couldn’t get in.

1833: Borrowed money to begin a business and by the end of the year, he was bankrupt. He spent the next 17 years paying off this debt.

1834: Ran for state legislature again — won.

1835: His fiancé died and his heart was broken.

1836: Had a nervous breakdown and was in bed

Giovanni Roselli. Courtesy Nike.

for six months.

1838: Sought to become speaker of the state legislature — defeated.

1840: Sought to become an elector — defeated.

1843: Ran for Congress — lost.

1846: Ran for Congress again and this time he won.

1848: Ran for reelection to Congress — lost.

1849: Sought the job of land officer in his home state — rejected.

1854: Ran for Senate of the United States — lost.

1856: Sought the vice presidential nomination at his party’s national convention — got less than 100 votes.

1858: Ran for U.S. Senate again — again he lost.

1860: Elected president of the United States.

So next time something doesn’t go your way, and as easy as it may be to throw in the towel, use it as a learning experience. If you are really driven, no amount of setbacks will deter you. It may take months, years, or even most of your life. Do you have the patience and mindset to achieve success?

To those who want to know the secret of success, news flash: The secret is there are no secrets.

Decide. Commit. Act. Succeed. Repeat.

Reach Giovanni on Twitter @GiovanniRoselli and at his website, GiovanniRoselli.com

KENYA, TANZANIA, ETHIOPIA & RWANDA TOURS Exceptional Camps & Lodges | Authentic Experiences | Private tours for groups and families with children

OUR TRIP WAS ONE OF THE MOST INTENSE, ASTONISHING AND INCREDIBLE TRAVEL EXPERIENCES I'VE EVER HAD. THE WHOLE EXPERIENCE WAS MAGICAL. I CAN'T WAIT TO JOIN JOHN ON ANOTHER TRIP. — Annie Chester, Los Angeles

“OUR ADVENTURE IN EAST AFRICA WAS A ONCE IN A LIFETIME EXPERIENCE, FROM THE EXTRAVAGANCE OF WILDLIFE IN AMBOSELI AND REMOTE VILLAGES IN SAMBURU, TO BREAKFAST OVERLOOKING NGORONGORO AND SCENERY ALONG THE PLAINS OF THE SERENGETI. THIS WAS A TRIP NOT EASILY FORGOTTEN.” — Evan Anthony, Cambridge MA

All packages include photography lessons | John Rizzo is a former Newsweek photographer, has worked on 6 continents & winner of two Arts Alive Grants, 2013 &2016

John Rizzo Photography | 455 Tarrytown Road Suite 1302 White Plains NY 10607 | (646) 221-6186 worldwide mobile | www.johnrizzophoto.com

PET OF THE MONTH

DARLING DOO DROP

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ew Drop is the soloist role in the “Waltz of the Flowers” that proceeds the climactic Grand Pas de Deux at the end of George Balanchine’s “The Nutcracker” at Lincoln Center.

Doo Drop is our Pet of the Month, a senior Yorkshire/Cairn terrier mix who deserves another Chrismukkah miracle. She’s had successful surgery on one eye and some malignant mammary tumors removed (with clean margins, we’re glad to report). But for this reason, she’s available for permanent foster, which means

the SPCA covers her medical costs.

All this puppy-like pooch, who gets along with other canines, needs now is a little love, preferably from someone who’s home more often than not.

And, come to think of it, isn’t that what we all want for the holidays?

To meet Doo Drop, visit the SPCA of Westchester at 590 N. State Road in Briarcliff Manor.

Founded in 1883, the SPCA is a no-kill shelter and is not affiliated with the ASPCA. The SPCA is open 10 a.m. to 4 p.m. Mondays through Saturdays and 1 to 4 p.m. Sundays. To learn more, call 914- 941-2896 or visit spca914.org.

Please help us reach our goal of rescuing 1 million pets this holiday season.

Support the Helen Woodward Home 4 the Holidays Adoption Drive.

Adopt Between October 1st and January 2nd and You Could Win a Year’s Supply of BLUE! Post your new best friend on Twitter or Instagram with #IChoseToRescue and tag @hwac and @bluebuffalo to be automatically entered. You could win a year’s supply of BLUE food for your pet and life-saving funds for the organization where you adopted.

Visit Home4TheHolidays.org

PET PORTRAITS

FOUR-LEGGED BOOKWORMS STORY AND PHOTOGRAPHS

BY ROBIN COSTELLO

O

n a recent stroll down Main Street in picturesque Poultney, Vermont, we wandered into Hermit Hill Books. Much to our delight, three four-legged full-time staffers — Fiona, Homer and Cody, pictured left from top — were ready to offer their opinions on a good read and give all the customers first-class treatment.

On any given day, Fiona, a beautiful black Border Collie, is on duty, warming up the easy chair in the front window. Cody, the Maine Coon cat, helps ring up the sales at the counter. And Homer, “The Literary Corgi,” stands by as a “sergeant of the stacks” — in case you need help finding a title.

No wonder this charming shop has been awarded Best Used/Antiquarian Bookstore in Vermont by Yankee Magazine. Should you be up in that area, stop by and say “hello” to the proprietor and pet owner Patty McWilliams — and don’t forget to bring some treats.

Hermit Hill Books is at 95 Main St., Poultney, Vermont. For more, call 802-287-5757 or visit Hermithillbooks.com.

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NOT-SO-JOLLY

FOODS

Pet safety tips for the holidays from BLUE BUFFALO® Sure, holidays can be joyous times filled with scrumptious meals, glittering lights and special shared moments with loved ones, including furry family members. But, consider the scene from your dog’s or cat’s perspective.

They’re usually peering up at a counter or table filled with the flavorful scents of food they shouldn’t eat, or pawing at tantalizing trinkets strung all over the house. Unfortunately, what’s festive for us can sometimes be dangerous for them.

As you entertain holiday guests, reinforce the “notable-scraps” rule. Remember, visitors may not be immune to your pet’s adorable beggar face. And as you prepare special meals keep these pet-toxic foods out of paw’s reach.

Foods that can harm dogs and cats: • Bread dough — Yeast expands in pets’ stomachs, causing pain.

• Chocolate —Pets can’t metabolize the theobromine in chocolate easily so it may build up to toxic levels. Chocolate also contains caffeine, another pet no-no.

• Ethanol/alcohol — Sorry, no toasting furry pals with bowls of eggnog!

• Moldy foods • Onions and garlic

Cats should avoid: • Milk and cheese — Most felines are lactose intolerant so only fill their bowls with water.

• Raw fish — Sorry, no holiday sushi. Bacteria in raw foods can make cats ill.

Toxicity levels from human foods vary depending upon the amount of food ingested and your pet’s size, but it’s not worth the risk. Avoid these foods altogether.

NOTE: If your pet ingests anything harmful, call your veterinarian immediately. Keep the pet poison hotline handy: 1-855-213-6680.

Happy, healthy holidays There are healthy ways to celebrate the season with furry loved ones.

Pet-safe toys and chews abound. Plus, your best pal can even enjoy their own holiday fare filled with wholesome, family-style dishes specially formulated for dogs or cats from Blue Buffalo. There are even real turkey and duck recipes!

Nutritious and delicious options like these make healthy stocking stuffers and give you a safer way to share this joyous season with your furry loved ones.

Learn more about BLUE™ at www.bluebuffalo.com

• Grapes and raisins • Fat trimmings and bones — No wishbones about it, pets can choke on bones, which can easily splinter and block your pet’s digestive system.

Dogs should avoid: • Avocado —Varieties like the Guatemalan avocado contain persin, which is toxic to dogs.

• Hops —Sorry, no seasonal craft beer.

• Macadamia nuts • Xylitol — No sugar-free products or candy. Instead, stuff their stockings with pet-appropriate treats like wholesome, cinnamon Santa Snacks from BLUE.™

Open your heart and home.

Help us rescue 1 Million pets this season! www.home4theholidays.org

DECK THE HALLS, SAFELY. In addition to foods, there are holiday decorations that can harm our furry pals so petproof your home with the following tips: • Avoid dangling, shimmering decorations like tinsel, ribbons and low-hanging lights. Pets might think they’re toys or even edible treats.

• Don’t place lit candles or glass ornaments where pets can knock them over. Cats are notorious climbers who can easily scale high surfaces and topple or break decor, endangering themselves as well.

• Avoid toxic seasonal plants. They may make stunning centerpieces, but…

— Holly and mistletoe are more toxic than poinsettias, which are harmful if large amounts are ingested. Their irritating sap however often keeps pets from having seconds.

— Live holiday trees and wreaths can shed sharp pine needles so sweep them up. Pets may paw at or try to eat them.

WHEN & WHERE

Through Jan. 28 Through Dec. 8

M&M Performing Arts and Red Monkey Theater Group bring an adaptation of Sir Arthur Conan Doyle’s “Sherlock Holmes: The Adventure of the Blue Carbuncle” to Lyndhurst. Together, the guests will explore the mansion room by room as they discover the mystery’s secrets. Dates and times vary, 635 S. Broadway, Tarrytown; 914-631-4481, lyndhurst.org

Through Dec. 17 The Hudson Valley Center for Contemporary Art presents “Women Warriors,” an exhibition by artists Isis Kenney and Cey Adams that honors the 100th anniversary of women’s suffrage as well as the continuing fight for equal rights in the public sphere. 11 a.m. to 5 p.m.

Tuesdays, noon to 6 p.m. Saturdays and Sundays, 1701 Main St., Peekskill; 914-788-0100, hvcca.org

The Hudson River Museum presents its annual guided tours of the museum’s historic home, Glenview, adorned with Victorian-themed holiday decorations by interior designer Debra Blair. 1 and 3 p.m. Wednesdays through Sundays, 511 Warburton Ave., Yonkers; 914963-4550; hrm.org

Through May 26 The New Castle Historical Society presents “Carrie Chapman Catt & The Women’s Suffrage Movement,” an exhibition that explores the life of a leading suffragist and former New Castle resident. 1 to 4 p.m. Tuesdays through Thursdays and Saturdays, New Castle Historical Society at Horace Greeley House, 100 King St., Chappaqua; 914-238-4666, newcastlehs.org

Dec. 1 and 3 New Choral Society opens its season with Handel’s “Messiah” and Durante’s “Magnificat.” Under the direction of John T. King, the chorus will be accompanied by its professional orchestra, as well as soloists from the Metropolitan Opera. 8 p.m. Friday and 3 p.m. Sunday, Hitchcock Presbyterian Church, 6 Greenacres Ave., Scarsdale; 914-725-1678, newchoralsociety.org

Dec.2 through Mar. 1

The Hudson Valley Center for Contemporary Art presents “Women Warriors.”

Through Dec. 22 The Center for the Digital Arts at Westchester Community College’s “Jade Doskow’s World Fairs” exhibition features Doskow’s photography of the remaining architecture, art and landscapes of international world fairs.

10 a.m. to 5 p.m. Mondays through Thursdays, 10 a.m. to 4 p.m. Fridays, 10 a.m. to 3 p.m. Saturdays, 27 N. Division St., Peekskill; 914-606-7300, sunywcc.edu/peekskill

“American Abstraction: The Print Revival of the 1960s and ’70s,” – This Bruce Museum show considers a turning point for printmaking in the early 1960s, with the rise of communal studios providing new avenues for creative and technical exchanges among artists. Many of the artists in the show pushed the medium in new directions. 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. Tuesdays through Sundays, 1 Museum Drive, Greenwich; 203869-0376, brucemuseum.org

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Dec. 5 The United Way Women’s Leadership Council presents its fifth annual celebration of “Women in Philanthropy” breakfast, featuring keynote speaker Dylan McGee and honoring Elizabeth Bracken-Thompson and Honorable Regent Judith Johnson. With emcee Michelle Brown. 8 to 10 a.m., Abigail Kirsch at Tappan Hill, 200 Gunpowder Lane, Tarrytown; 914- 9976700, uwwp.org

Dec. 2

Dec. 7 The Hamm & Clov Stage Company presents “NOOR,” an original dance theater work that follows a Sufi pacifist brought up in a house filled with music, art, and spirituality through her journey as a spy during World War II. 8 p.m., Suzanne Werner Wright Theatre at Sarah Lawrence College, 1 Mead Way, Yonkers; 914-963-6222, hammandclov.org

Dec. 3

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The Suzanne Farrell Ballet – under the direction of Farrell, perhaps George Balanchine’s most celebrated muse – will celebrate one of its final performances at Purchase College’s Performing Arts Center. The company has been acclaimed for its insightful interpretations of Balanchine’s neoclassical, New York-flavored repertoire. 8 p.m., 735 Anderson Hill Road; 914-2516200, artscenter.org

The Vienna Boys Choir returns to The Klein Auditorium with its holiday concert. Some 100 choristers from 31 nations between the ages of 10 and 14 are divided among four touring choirs. 7 p.m., 910 Fairfield Ave., Bridgeport; 800-424-0160, ext. 2, theklein.org

Guitarist-singer John Pizzarelli returns with his wife, Broadway singer Jessica Molaskey, to the Quick Center.

Along with Pizzarelli’s trio, the duo will share their interpretations of songs from the Great American Songbook mixed with Christmas classics. 3 p.m., Fairfield University’s Regina A. Quick Center for The Arts, 1073 N. Benson Road; 203-254-4010, quickcenter.fairfield.edu

The Center for Digital arts at WCC presents a photographic exhibit “Jade Doskow’s World Fairs.”

John Pizzarelli and Jessica Molaskey at the Quick Center for the Arts

Tickets to shows make great gifts! december

Non-profit 501 (c) (3)

6 Melissa Etheridge: Merry Christmas, Baby 7 Tim Currie’s Motown Review Band “A Motown Holiday” 8 Linda Eder: Holiday Show Performing holiday favorites and Broadway tunes!

10 Christmas with The Celts

Irish & Scottish Carols, Christmas favorites, Irish dancing & more!

Gift cards available!

january

22 Broadway Sings Stevie Wonder Broadway stars sing Stevie Wonder’s greatest hits!

25 Brandy Clark

With hits “Stripes,” “Sugar Daddy” & more!

27 Judy Gold and Bruce Vilanch “Big and Tall”

february

2 Arrival: The Music of Abba

17 Rockapella Holiday

3 Debbie Gravitte’s Big Band Broadway

20 The Oak Ridge Boys Christmas Celebration

7 Willie Nile & Trace Bundy

Sprinkle your holiday season with vocal magic!

Holiday classics with country music Hall of Famers!

january

11 Colin Quinn “One In Every Crowd” 12 Jim Messina

9 Rich Vos, Ron Bennington & Jim Florentine: A Night of Comedy Headliners 11 Garrison Keillor

“Just Passing Through”

13 Masters of Illusion

19 Charles Esten

From CMT’s Nashville Opening Act: Charlie Scopoletti

20 The Lords of 52nd Street:

Original members of Billy Joel Band

Brain-bending illusions

16 Fleetwood Macked & The McCartney Years 17 Billy Gardell

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Music on the Hill presents “Sounds Of The Season,” its traditional Christmas concert of the Jubilate Ringers handbell choir and Festival Chorus, together with favorite carols sung by all, accompanied by St. Matthew’s organ. 7:30 p.m., St. Matthew’s Episcopal Church at WEPCO, 36 New Canaan Road, Wilton; 203-529-3133, www.musiconthehillct.org

Dec. 16 Danbury’s Ives Concert Park presents Harlem Gospel Choir performing contemporary gospel with a touch of jazz and blues. 7 p.m., Veronica Hagman Concert Hall, Visual and Performing Arts Center, Western Connecticut State University, 43 Lake Ave. Ext.; 203-837-8732, ivesconcertpark.com

Dec. 17 TheatreWorks USA’s production of the musical version of “A Christmas Carol” is recommended for children ages 6 to 13. 1 and 4 p.m., Westport Country Playhouse, 25 Powers Court; 203-227-4177, westportplayhouse.org

The 29th annual performance of “The Nutcracker” by Ballet Etudes Company at Westport Country Playhouse. Dec. 9, 10 and 16.

Dec. 9 Celebrate the season with the Stamford Symphony and the MasterVoices chorus performing music from Handel’s “Messiah” at Stamford’s Basilica of St. John the Evangelist. 8 p.m., 279 Atlantic St.; 203-325-4466, stamfordsymphony.org

The Westport Historical Society’s Holiday House Tour is a tradition of local historic homes that have been dressed for the holidays. This year’s tour explores seven 18th- and 19th-century homes while featuring a pop-up holiday store, hot cider and cookies. 11 a.m., 25 Avery Place, 203-222-1424, westporthistory.org

Dec. 9, 10 and 16

Decw. 13

The Ballet Etudes Company returns to the Westport Country Playhouse for its 29th annual performance of “The Nutcracker,” with a cast of more than 100 dancers that includes professional guest artists. 1 and 4 p.m., 25 Powers Court; 203-227-4177, westportplayhouse.org

Downtown Music at Grace Church presents a 30th anniversary event, “Element Songs,” which features six world premieres on the themes of earth, water and air by six contemporary composers. 12:10 p.m., 33 Church St., White Plains, 914-949-0384, dtmusic.org

Dec.10 The Lockwood-Mathews Mansion Museum celebrates the season with a Holiday Open House, featuring several hours of entertainment, including ballet, jazz, contemporary, hip-hop and holiday-inspired dance and choral youth performances. Noon, 295 West Ave., Norwalk; 203-838-9799, lockwoodmathewsmansion.com

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Dec. 15 The Westport Library presents an opening reception for an exhibition of recent paintings by Susan Fehlinger, “From City to Sea,” that depicts familiar yet abstracted settings or themes, emphasizing texture, color and light, and contrasting bold cityscapes. The show runs through Feb. 23. 6 p.m., The Great Hall, Westport Library, 20 Jesup Road; 203-291-4800, westportlibrary.org

Theatre Works USA presentation of “A Christmas Carol” at Westport Country Playhouse “Aaron Neville Christmas” brings the soul singer to Fairfield. 8 p.m., The Warehouse at FTC, 70 Sanford St.; 203-259-1036, fairfieldtheatre.org

The Symphony of Westchester’s All-Baroque concert will feature concertmaster Alexander Abayev performing Antonio Vivaldi’s “The Four Seasons.” 3 p.m., Iona College’s Christopher J. Murphy Auditorium, 715 North Ave., New Rochelle; 914-654-4926, thesymphonyofwestchester.org

Dec. 20 The Oak Ridge Boys have long been a part of their fans’ holiday seasons with their annual Christmas tour.

This year they will stop in Ridgefield with their mixture of traditional and contemporary songs, including religious, romantic and fun holiday tunes. 8 p.m., The Ridgefield Playhouse, 80 E. Ridge; 203-438-5795, ridgefieldplayhouse.org

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SHOWING THE ‘WAY’

United Way’s Annual Day of Golf took place recently at Mount Kisco Country Club and raised more than $100,000 to help those in need in Westchester and Putnam counties become self-sufficient and thrive. This year’s honoree was Bud Hammer, president of Atlantic Westchester, a commercial and industrial HVAC and energy efficiency company in Bedford Hills, who was recognized for his continued support and dedication to the community.

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1. Alana Sweeny and Bud Hammer

A ‘BEAUTIFUL NIGHT’

The St. Elizabeth Seton Children’s Foundation recently hosted its annual fall fundraiser, “Bella Notte,” the most successful event to date for the benefit of the children served by the Elizabeth Seton Pediatric Center, the John A. Coleman School and the Children’s Rehabilitation Center. More than 300 guests attended the event, which featured special guest lifestyle guru Sandra Lee. and chef Raffaele Ronca. After the evening’s entertainment, guests were treated to mouthwatering Italian fare made by Rafael Ristorante. Photographs

by Chris Marksbury/CM Photos.

2. Michael, Matthew and Susie Welling 3. John A. Coleman School alumnus Matthew, Elizabeth Seton Pediatric Center resident Stephanie, Shelley Mayer, David Buchwald and Kristen O’Grady front row: James Maxson, Raffaele Ronca, Sandra Lee and Andrea Stewart-Cousins 4. Franco D’Alessandro, Raffaele Ronca and Ann Cacase 5. Peter McKeever and Pat Tursi 6. Anthony and Christina DiPietro, Danielle Zimbaro and Dwayne Doherty 7. Marielle and Karina Verni 8. Luciano Lamonarca and Vito Verni 9. Rachel Amar, Dr. Israel Franco, Lisa Wickens-Alteri, Janet Franco and Catherine Franzetti 10. Raffaele Ronca, and Pediatric Center resident Stephanie and Sandra Lee 11. John and Beth Caruso, Brian Harrington and Shannon and Michael Gallagher

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A BALL FOR ALL SEASONS A sold-out crowd of more than 300 guests attended The Kennedy Center’s 53rd annual “Four Seasons” Ball at Rolling Hills Country Club in Wilton. The popular event honored the many accomplishments of Martin D. Schwartz, the retiring president and CEO of The Kennedy Center, over a nearly 40-year career. Proceeds from the evening benefited The Kennedy Center’s residential services for people with disabilities. Photographs by Stuart Walls/Woodstock Studio.

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1. Dorothy Larson and Armando Goncalves 2. Rob, Kelly and Katie Scinto and Joseph Emanuel 3. Paul and Kathy Miller 4. Richard Blumenthal 5. Barbara and Bob Scinto 6. Christine Donahue Brown and her brother Michael, a Kennedy Center client 7. Martin, Elaine and Michael Schwartz and Allyson Mandelbaum

UJA KICKOFF More than 100 of Westchester’s most philanthropic donors came together to kick off UJA-Federation of New York’s 2018 Annual Campaign and celebrate the organization’s work. Guests heard from actress Marlee Matlin at the event, which took place at a private home in Scarsdale. Matlin has dedicated herself to raising awareness for many humanitarian causes, including diversity and LGBTQ rights, and has served as a champion for the deaf, children and those struggling against domestic abuse and addiction. Funds raised at the event go to UJA-Federation, which sustains the activities of a network that includes hundreds of nonprofits, including more than 80 core partners, a dozen of which are in Westchester.

8. Seth and Linda Plattus 9. Beth Scharfman, Uri Shabto and Rikki and Barry Kaplan 10. Fiona Silver and Steven Silver 11. Marlee Matlin

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Call (914) 849 - MyMD to find the right doctor for your personalized needs.

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December The Suzanne Farrell Ballet Farewell Tour A pageant of iconic favorites December 3, 3pm

Rudolph The Red-Nosed Reindeer: The Musical Based on the animated TV special December 12, 7pm

National Theatre Live Follies December 17, 3pm

The Rob Mathes Holiday Concert A PAC Holiday tradition December 15&16, 8pm

Coming up in 2018 1/20 Kronos Quartet 1/27 Chamber Music Society of Lincoln Center 2/2 GlobalFEST on Tour The New Golden Age of Latin Music 2/10 wild Up 2/11 Velvet Caravan 2/24 Chamber Music Society of Lincoln Center 2/25 American Rhapsody: The Gershwin Songbook

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Brentano Quartet Mozart, Guillaume Lekeu, Brahms December 9, 8pm

Westchester Philharmonic Winter Pops!

Vocalist Laura Michelle Kelly December 17, 3pm

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Pictured: Natalia Magnicaballi & Michael Cook Gounod Symphony The SuzanneFarrell Ballet Š Paul Kolnik

914.251.6200 www.artscenter.org

Thank You

LUCILLE WERLINICH,

Chair of Purchase College Foundation

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RISING FOR A GOOD CAUSE More than 300 guests attended the Leake & Watts’ sold-out “Together We Rise” annual awards gala, held recently at the Pierre Hotel in Manhattan.

The evening raised more than $700,000 to help disadvantaged children. Honorees were Frances R. Olivieri, who received the Thelma Stackhouse Award for her 40 years of service to the board, and Bobby Hotaling, president and CEO, and Gina Fini Hotaling, partner, at The Hotaling Group, who received the Champion for Children Award. MSNBC anchor and NBC News correspondent Stephanie Ruhle was the evening’s emcee, and Chuck Nice, a stand-up comic and co-host with Dr. Neil deGrasse Tyson of “Star Talk” led the live auction.

1. Greg Kawsnicki, Sharron Madden, and Gifty Ansah 2. Nick Preddice and Jacques Boubli 3. Alan Mucatel and Lisa Preddice 4. Barbara Jackson and Agnes Hassell 5. Gina and Bobby Hotaling 6. Elyse Boubli, Lisa Preddice and Mark and Jody Rollins 7. Muhammed Wilkerson and Christian Peter 8. Frances Olivieri and Stephanie Ruhle 9. Chuck Nice and Tess Wachs

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BIG ‘IMAGINE’-NATION The Friends of White Plains Hospital hosted their annual gala recently at the Brae Burn Country Club in Purchase. More than 600 attended the“Imagine” gala, which raised more than $1 million to support the expansion of pediatric services at White Plains Hospital. The event was co-chaired by Anna and Vincent Cappucci, of Harrison; Geralyn and Ralph Della Cava, of Scarsdale; and Kathleen and Christopher Winterroll, also of Scarsdale. Guests enjoyed dinner, dancing and a “Bids for Kids” live auction, which in itself raised more than $200,000.

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10. Jeffrey Menkes, Susan Fox and Margaret and Larry Smith 11. Geralyn Della Cava, Wendy Berk, Kathleen Winterroll, Anna Cappucci and Nancy Clarvit 12. Rafael Torres

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STILL THEY RISE “Rise, Fight, Inspire” was the theme of the Breast Cancer Alliance’s 22nd annual Luncheon and Fashion Show at the Hyatt Regency in Greenwich, which brought together more than 1,000 supporters Oct. 26. Longtime sponsor Richards dazzled the audience with a haute couture runway presentation of Oscar de la Renta’s new collection. The professional models were preceded down the catwalk by 13 brave, beautiful women who have had, or are living with, breast cancer, showcasing Richards’ fall selections.

Amy Robach, news anchor of ABC’s “Good Morning America” and author of The New York Times best seller “Better,” was the featured speaker, talking about her own journey with breast cancer. The event raised more than $1.4 million — as well as many spirits. Photographs by Elaine and Chichi Ubiña.

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Courtney Olsen and Meg Russell Andrew Mitchell, Jack Mitchell and Scott Mitchell Carol Santora and Margaret Sinclair Ken Mifflin, Ellen Richman, Marsha Mifflin and Tami Berczuk Pinky Markey and Gina Delano Karen Kiarsis, Susan Thorkelson, Nancy Smith, Joan Whipple, MaryJo Razook, Didi McCormick and Holly Kennedy Ann and Ken Lockyer Whitney Keyes, Cheryl Floyd, Jacquelyn Smith, Janea Neuenfeldt, Elizabeth Coelho, Dara Johnson, Laura White and Kolleen Evers Loren Taufield and Mary Van Pelt Susan Randolph Tami Bowling Susan Bevan Heather and Taylor Black Lauren Fuchs and Donna Twist Sue Delepine, Julie Cusimano, Sophie Pelletier-Martinelli, Xandy Duffy and Claire Kiger Kathy Clark, Suzanne Sennatt, Ashley Cole and Catherine Marcus Alease Fisher Tallman and Kathy Georges Lynne Wheat and Regina Gabelli Lexy Tanner and Jane Batkin Caroline Brown and Mia Gyesky Carol Henderson and Jill Coyle Gretchen Bylow, Hillary Corbin, Jordan Rhodes, Amy Robach, Yonni Wattenmaker and Mary Jeffery

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A ‘TASTE’FUL EVENING The Arc of Westchester Foundation hosted its 14th annual “A Matter of Taste” event recently at the Glen Island Harbour Club in New Rochelle. The event featured signature cuisine prepared by more than 30 area chefs, accompanied by a wide assortment of fine wine and craft beer. All proceeds will support The Arc of Westchester Foundation, which is dedicated to increasing public awareness and raising financial resources to support programs and services for those with intellectual and developmental disabilities and their families.

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Rudolf Laager and Claudia and Maarten van Hengel Dan Konopka and Rich Petriccione Catherine Swierat and Laura Landegger Lisa Salvadorini, Ric Swierat and Rosa Rodriguez Elaine Masket and Peter Herrero,Jr.

GREEN ON THE GREENS FOR HSS The Hospital for Special Surgery (HSS) hosted its first HSS Golf Benefit to Support Sports Medicine Research recently at Winged Foot Golf Club in Mamaroneck. Guests enjoyed a round of golf followed by a cocktail hour and a dinner reception.

Through their research, sports medicine surgeons at HSS are developing breakthrough techniques to improve outcomes for athletes of all abilities. Photographs by Chuan Ding.

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6. Nannette Hill 7. Dr. David Altchek 8. Joe Zajac, Emil Calcano, Stacey Malakoff and Louis A. Shapiro 9. John Starks and Larry Johnson 10. Dr. Joshua Dines and Nannette Hill 11. Dr. Bryan Kelly

HOLLYWOOD EAST Wartburg, a premier senior care and housing provider in Mount Vernon, was the backdrop during a filming of season four of CBS’s hit series “Madam Secretary.” Over the course of several days during a two-week period, Wartburg hosted the cast and crew, including stars Téa Leoni, Tim Daly, Keith Carradine and BeBe Neuwirth, along with more than 100 crew members of Eye Productions Inc. Wartburg’s campus was transformed into a homeland security office, a bed and breakfast and featured a presidential motorcade, using various sites throughout Wartburg’s historic 34-acre campus.

12. Angela Ciminello, David Gentner, Téa Leoni, Erich Bergen and Karen Thomas.

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DECEMBER 2017

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Eager Beaver Tree Service INTELLIGENT TREE CARE ARTISTIC DESIGN DETAIL ORIENTED LONG TERM PLANNING-IMMEDIATE RESULTS SATISFACTION GUARANTEED!

EXTRAORDINARY Serving Westchester and Fairfield 914-533-2255 | 203-869-3280 |

203-966-6767

www.eagerbeavertreeservice.com Doug Paulding | Dpupatree@aol.com

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WATCH

OOH LA LA Ernest Hemingway called Paris in the 1920s “A Moveable Feast” and that was the theme for the New Rochelle Public Library Foundation’s fall fundraiser, a “progressive dinner” catered by Posto 22 that took guests café hopping from a first-floor “salon” to a second-floor “dining room” created inside the library. The Blue Vipers of Brooklyn provided period dance music and “celebrities” — library supporters dressed as Zelda Fitzgerald, George Gershwin, Josephine Baker and other luminaries — helped transport guests to Roaring ’20s Paris for the night. A silent auction offered a variety of tempting treasures, including a bottle of wine (1966 Haut Brion Graves) from Hemingway’s own cellar. A “Wine and Spirits” pull also provided some fun, with $20 tickets yielding anything from a $10 bottle of wine to pricier pours such as Veuve Cliquot Champagne or Johnny Walker Red. Photographs by Susan Nagib.

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1. Anne Yeckley Todd, Amy Bass and Evan Klupt 2. Joe Tomei (Ernest Hemingway), Julia Breanetta Simpson (Bricktop Smith), Ron Kanner (Salvador Dali), Joe Rosina (Pablo Picasso), Andrea Rothberg (Edith Piaf), Peter Rothberg (George Gershwin), Bernie Michaels and Haina Just-Michaels, (F. Scott and Zelda Fitzgerald) 3. Roy and Kathy Gilwit 4. Catie Stern and Chris Selin

TALKING HEALTH More than 200 health care thought leaders and executives, researchers and academics, technology entrepreneurs, biotech start-ups, venture capitalists, bankers, real estate developers, and businesses — all those with a stake in Westchester’s and the New York metropolitan region’s future — attended HealthTech ’17, organized by the Westchester County Association at The Doubletree Hotel in Tarrytown. Hot topics for the daylong event included the opioid epidemic, telehealth, cancer treatment and the fate of Obamacare. Photographs by Lynda Curtis.

5. Cynthia Williams and Guy Leibler 6. Dr. Craig B. Thompson 7. Kathleen O'Connor, Stephanie Marquesano, Jonathan Avery, Mark O’Neill and Stephen J. Ferrando 8. Amy Allen and M. Beatrice Grause 9. Susan Fox and William M. Mooney Jr. 10. Kevin Dahill and Michael J. Fosina 11. Amada Rafel and Simone O’Donovan 12. Katy and Will Siegel

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GLOWING IN GREENWICH Greenwich Hospital’s gala fundraiser was a “GLOW’ing success, raising more than $500,000 for oncology services. Supporters from Fairfield and Westchester counties joined in the festivities, held at Greenwich Country Club. The party began with cocktails and silent and wine auctions in the club’s main living room and bar. Guests entered the ballroom for dinner, which was transformed into an autumnal paradise. The walls were draped in sunset-toned, shimmering fabric panels. Overhead were twinkle lights and decorative spheres covered in colorful fall leaves. Bronze vases filled with dahlias in burgundy, plum and orange added to the warm glow of the room. Sotheby’s led a spirited live auction that included a “year of shoes” from Richards, signed artwork by Peter Max, a Tahitian pearl and diamond necklace, dinner in your home from Rao’s and dazzling Buccellati chandelier earrings.

Following the live auction, guests flooded the dance floor, inspired by the eclectic selection of music performed by Billy Stone Band.

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1. Arthur Martinez, Dr. Philip J. McWhorter and Norman G. Roth

SAN MIGUEL’S ANGELS The Mara family, owner of the New York Giants, has long been a supporter of San Miguel Academy of Newburgh, a tuition-free school for 68 at risk boys in grades 5 through 8 that breaks the cycle of poverty through education. Continuing with the philanthropic tradition, five Mara sisters recently attended the school's annual “Defying the Odds” benefit dinner at the Westchester Country Club.

2. Maureen Mara Brown, Colleen Mara McLane, Ann Mara Cacase, the Rev. Mark Connell, Sheila Mara and Susan Mara McDonnell

SPOTLIGHTING MENTAL HEALTH

Cognitive and Behavioral Consultants co-founders Alec L. Miller and Lata K. McGinn recently celebrated the grand opening of the Schwartzberg Training Center, a new mental health training facility in White Plains. Sixty colleagues and friends attended the ribbon-cutting event, including Harris and Nicole Schwartzberg, for whom the Center is named, and actress Glenn Close and New York Giants wide receiver Brandon Marshal, both mental health advocates. Photographs by Rocco Campanelli.

3. Gregg and Debbie Weiner and Dr. Alec L. Miller 4. Dr. Lata K. McGinn and Molly, Nicole and Harris Schwartzberg

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WAGVERTISERS D EC EM B ER 2017

121 Restaurant – 91 121restaurant.com

Ethan Allen Hotel - 48 ethanallenhotel.com

Oasis Day Spa - 93 oasiswestchester.com

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Susan G. Komen - 82 ww5.komen.org

Balduccis - 37 balduccis.com

Greenwich Medical Spa - 63 greenwichmedicalspa.com

The Performing Arts Center - 133 artscenter.org

Technique Catering – 36 techniquecatering.com

The Barn Door - 113 barndoorridgefield.com

Greenwich Reindeer Festival - 129 greenwichreindeerfestival.com

Neil S. Berman - 66 bermanbuyscollectables.com

Hospital for Special Surgery – 81 hss.edu/westchester

R&M Woodrow Jewelers – inside front cover, 1 woodrowjewelers.com

Val’s Putnam Wines and Liquors - 135 valsputnamwines.com

Berlin Talent Inc. - 26 berlintalentinc.com

The Heights – 110 theheightsatbrothervics.com

Ridgefield Playhouse - 127 ridgefieldplayhouse.org

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Il Forno - 107 ilfornosomers.com

Rocks - 41 facebook.com/Rocks-by-JolieB-Ray

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Briggs House Antiques – 40 briggshouse.com Bruce Museum - 143 brucemuseum.org The C.V. Rich Mansion - 131 cvrich.com Cami Weinstein Designs - 89 camidesigns.com Centerline Stables - 49 centerlinestables.org ColumbiaDoctors Radiology - 87 columbiaradiology.org Deloitte – 18 Deloitte.com Donna Bunte – Whole Health - 83 donnabunte.com Eager Beaver Tree Service - 139 eagerbeavertreeservice.com

Royal Closet - 6 royalcloset.com

Ives Concert Park - 44 ivesconcertpark.com

Westchester Medical Center Health Network – 27, 84, 85 wmchealth.org

Royal Regency Hotel - 7 royalregencyhotelny.com

The J House Greenwich – 67 jhousegreenwich.com Kisco River Eatery - 111 kiscoriver.com

Saybrook Point Inn & Spa back cover saybrook.com

Kristals Cosmetics - 98 kristals.com

Schoolhouse Theater - 106 schoolhousetheater.org

Maison Beauty Lounge - 15 maisonbeautylounge.com

Skin Center – Advanced Medical Aesthetics – 117 bestskincenter.com

Miller Motorcars – 23 millermotorcars.com

Westchester Philharmonic - 48 westchesterphil.org White Plains Hospital – 86, 130, 132, 134, 136 wphospital.org

Skinner – 3 skinnerinc.com

Muscoot Tavern - 115 muscoottavern.com

Waveny LifeCare Network - 45 waveny.org

Winston Restaurant - 53 winstonrestaurant.com Yonkers Tennis Club - 51 yonkerstennis.com

Sothebys International Realty – inside back cover sothebyshomes.com

New Canaan Olive Oil - 99 newcanaanoliveoil.com New York Presbyterian/ Lawrence Hospital - 119 nyp.org/Lawrence-ortho

SoundworksNY - 71 soundworksny.com

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WAGMAG.COM

DECEMBER 2017

ANNE JORDAN DUFFY

BARBARA HANLON

CINDY PAGNOTTA

MARCIA PFLUG

PATRICE SULLIVAN

Treasures of the Earth:

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Mineral Masterpieces from the Robert R. Wiener Collection November 11, 2017 through April 1, 2018

Calcite and Scolecite Robert R. Wiener Collection #1636 Photo: Paul Mutino

BRUCE MUSEUM

Greenwich, CT | brucemuseum.org

WE WONDER:

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HOW DO YOU MAINTAIN G R ACE U NDER PRESSU RE? *

Rashad Brooks

Anthony Caparelli EMT, New Rochelle resident

Emma Dugas

student, White Plains resident

Charlie Fernandos

Sandra Guerfi

“One of the best ways I’ve found to maintain grace is by putting up a wall between myself and whatever is stressing me out.”

“I try to remember what my goals are and stay focused on those, instead of the pressure around me. I get satisfaction from persevering and seeing how my positive attitude impacts others.”

“In my self-defense class, I learned that the first step in dealing with pressure is to breathe. I try to apply that to all kinds of situations.”

“When I find myself in a stressful situation, I try to kill it with kindness.”

“Through experience, I’ve learned that people have layers and what you perceive isn’t necessarily the whole story. When someone makes me feel stress or pressure I do my best to remember that and try to improve their attitude by example.”

Bose employee, White Plains resident

Shane Keaney

Yogibo employee, Greenburgh resident

freelance designer, Scarsdale resident

maintenance supervisor, Eastchester resident

Rob Murphy

Patricia Small retail/sales, Ossining resident

Sarah Smith

retired, Mount Vernon resident

Diamond Swann

“It might sound simple, but sometimes taking a break or going for a walk is the best way to relieve the pressure in your head.”

“When I was a kid, my mother told me to count to 10 before I react to anything.

I follow that advice to this day.”

“I wish I could say that I do.”

“I try to keep my grace through prayer.”

“I think the best way to keep your grace is to be patient and smile. Positivity is contagious.”

*Asked throughout central and northern Westchester County at various businesses.

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sales representative, Bronx resident

WAGMAG.COM

DECEMBER 2017

LensCrafters supervisor, White Plains resident