| Event
Location
Wölffer Estate Vineyard & Stables
139 Sagg Road, Sagaponack, NY
Saturday, July 12, 5:00 p.m. to
8:00 p.m.
Advance purchase price: members $150, guests
$200
At the door: members $175, guests $225
Back in 1956, the Hamptons was a quiet, sparsely
populated community of fishermen and farmers, artists and vacationers,
many of whom couldn’t afford homes closer to the city. Across
the country in California, Sonoma served up a similarly serene setting.
But 1956 was the year Chuck Williams purchased a hardware store
in downtown Sonoma, which he converted into a French cookware shop,
and the first Williams-Sonoma store was born. Today, there are 235
Williams-Sonoma stores across the United States and Canada, and
Sonoma sleeps no more. It is a hub of fine California wine production
and a metaphor for the idyllic northern California lifestyle. The
Hamptons has changed, too. It offers a different type of idyllic
lifestyle: beautiful landscapes, beaches, and historic towns crowded
with mega-mansions, each with at least one glimmering kitchen stocked,
more often than not, with products purchased at Williams-Sonoma.
Coincidence? Not this year.
Chuck Williams is the guest of honor at this
year’s Chefs & Champagne, in which we are celebrating
the centennial of James Beard’s birth. Now Vice Chairman of
the Board of Directors of Williams-Sonoma, he has helped the company
evolve into North America’s source for culinary finery and
top-of-the-line housewares. James Beard certainly shopped there
for his batterie de cuisine. But more than that, the two
men were good friends.
For his business success and philanthropic
endeavors, Williams has been honored with all sorts of awards, including
the D’Artagnan Cervena Who’s Who of Food and Beverage
in America and our Lifetime Achievement Award, Bon Appétit’s
1999 Tastemaker of the Year Award, and the Housewares Foundation’s
Humanitarian of the Year Award for his support of the Boys and Girls
Club of America and of cancer and AIDS research.
It wouldn’t be a party in the Hamptons
if Beard Trustee, cocktail commentator, and social trendsetter Nina
Griscom didn’t agree to chair it. Griscom is a contributing
editor to Food & Wine, More, and Allure,
and has been a graceful, knowledgeable presence on many television
shows. And it wouldn’t be a Champagne party without the elegant
effervescence of Champagne Charles Heidsieck, founded in 1851. Both
will bubble over with delicious hospitality at our evening soirée,
which is being held once again on the stunning grounds of the Wölffer
Estate Vineyard in Sagaponack, New York. Wölffer’s award-winning
wines helped put Long Island wines on the oenophile’s map.
There will be more than two dozen chefs offering tastings, too.
Don’t miss this annual highlight of Hamptons
social season. Great chefs, delicious food, warm hosts, old friends,
summer fashions, silent auction, elegant setting, fine Champagne,
and superb wines. Sounds like our kind of party.
Silent but sumptuous…
Our Chefs & Champagne auction promises
to be the best ever this year, starting with a cornucopia of cookware
and tabletop treasures. There will be rare wines, exotic travel,
private cooking classes, and meals with extraordinary chefs. Don’t
miss this irresistible shopping opportunity! |
