TOWN JEWELS
“I’d rather be on a beach in Tahiti,” Harry Fane said nervously before the start of his lunch for 100 people at Harry’s Bar in London to mark his annual exhibition of Verdura jewelry.
His guests seemed relaxed by comparison, with Cosima Pavoncelli, who’s five months pregnant, seeking tips on child rearing and Isabel Goldsmith, her hand heavily bandaged, recounting her automobile accident in Mexico.
Four nights later, another jeweler — Bulgari — sponsored a gala cocktail party in the gardens of London’s Hempel Hotel to benefit the National Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Children. As the rain rattled down outside the tent, the main topic was whether guests would brave the showers to go to Ascot the next day.
Lord Kenilworth wasn’t planning on it.
“I knew the weather was going to be lousy,” said the garden designer, who was jetting off to Moscow a few days later to start a project for the owner of Russia’s largest oil company.
“It’s my first job in Russia,” he added. “I told him he better have dollars.”