Blo | Blow Dry Bar

ROCKIN' UP A ROLL: Don't tell anyone at the Juvenile Diabetes Research Foundation that charitable giving has slumped. The 10th-annual Rockin' For Research gala, which went at the Hyatt Regency hotel recently, reportedly topped 2008's haul by raising $975,000 quicker than Loverboy singer Mike Reno could get back into his trademark leather pants. That band was honoured this year for founding the annual benefit. It also performed on a bill with Chilliwack, Camille and Saffron Henderson, and former Payola$ member Paul Hyde.

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HOT STUFF: Four Seasons Hotel general manager Simon Pettigrew and executive chef Oliver Beckert entertained -- and fed -- 150 or so city women in the kitchen Thursday. Wear pink in the hotel's Yew room Fridays, Pettigrew promised, and you'll get more free nibblies.

Thursday, his guests got courtesy cocktails and hair touch-ups by Blo Blow Dry Bar personnel. Blo boss Judy Brooks said that chain's seventh outlet will open in Oakville, Ont. Nov. 21, with Calgary, south Surrey, two more in Toronto and a possible in San Francisco by April, 2010.

Complementing Blo's techniques, pastry chef Wayne Kozinko whipped up Raspberry Lemon Fizz. Method: Simmer sugar-water and fresh lemon zest, chill on ice, strain, add fresh lemon juice, place in a CO2 pressure dispenser, squirt into large shot glasses, top with a skewered raspberry frosted with "fizzy powder." Oh, yeah. Wear pink.

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BEARING ARMS: When the Contemporary Art Gallery offered Elizabeth Zvonar a solo exhibition, she needed a hand. Twelve, in fact, With arms attached. They were to support a tilting-wall installation she would name Legs. C'mon, folks, it's art, right?

Several retailers nixed her requests for retired store-mannequin limbs. But Holt Renfrew came across, and Zvonar had British Classic Auto bodyshop painter Kiwi Malcolm spray them glossy black. Legs and and other works debuted Thursday at the Nelson-at-Richards gallery, a six-block stroll from Holt's.

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POURING DOWN: It rained almost hard enough Tuesday for the Joe Fortes restaurant's late namesake to reprise his century-ago swimming classes on Thurlow Street. Inside, the aptly named Slurp & Swirl wingding, saw the joint's ever-festive patrons belly up to numerous wine stations, swallow bushels of raw oysters, and raise some $35,000 for the B.C Professional Fire Fighters' Burn Fund.

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FLAKE TAKERS: Yet another liquor "brand ambassador" shuttled through town this week. Given drinking's contributions to marital straying, a more apt diplomatic role might be charge d'affaires. At a seventh-anniversary party in the Opus hotel lounge, ambassador Charlotte Voisey presented Hendrick's Gin, which comes from Scotland rather than London. Still Voisey, who is also a mixologist -- i.e., bartender -- had attendees speak highly of her concoctions, which folk so seldom do regarding free drinks. Among her recipes, Rose 75 contained an ounce of Hendrick's gin, half-ounces each of fresh lemon and rose-infused simple syrup, sparkling rose wine, and gold flakes for ambassadorial cachet.

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HELL'S BELLBOYS: Extra-chipper at the Opus party was the hotel's former general manager, Daniel Craig. Turning novelist in 2007, he promptly wrote three popular chillers. The most recent, Murder At Gravely Manor, was his first set in Vancouver -- at a West End Bed & Breakfast. Now, after six months of global goofing-off, he's penning a non-mystery. "It'll involve guest and manager interplay in a San Francisco hotel where everything goes wrong," Craig said.

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TALKIN' BALKAN: Launching the Serbian Film Festival this week, program director Edi Osghian said that nation of eight million produced 30 feature films this year. He spoke at a reception in the Shaughnessy home of festival founder, architect and National Forming Systems Inc. president Peter Vladikovic. Osghian himself co-produced and directed The Next Great Chef TV series in Canada, but now favours sub-million-dollar feature movies. "We're not trying to make festival films, but ones that will make money," he said.

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WINDSOR WHEELS: Vern Bethel's 1939 McLaughlin-Buick convertible limousine has hauled royal visitors around town since King George VI and Queen Elizabeth came that year. Prince Charles and Princess Diana rode in it to open Expo 86. But it stayed in its garage last week. Let's guess security worriers ruled out the bus-sized ragtop. Surely it wasn't Camilla choosing not to sit where Di did, eh what?

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JUST DESSERTS: Eleventh-year B.C. Court of Appeal judge Mary Saunders will receive the Anthony P. Pantages Medal at the Justice Institute of B.C. Foundation's gala Dec. 2. The commemorative award recognizes "significant contributions in the field of justice." For his public-safety efforts, Carcross Tagish First Nation Chief Mark Wedge will receive the Joseph H. Cohen Award.

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SETTING IT STRAIGHT: Anna Wallner had her 40th birthday in Palm Springs recently, not, as I reported, The Shopping Bags TV-series co-host Kristina Matisic, who attended the nine-woman party.

Malcolm Parry, Vancouver Sun, Nov 14, 2009

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