This morning I was on the phone ordering samples from a supplier here when he asked me “Do you have the e-mail?” and suddenly I was speaking with the Irish Version of Bill Cosby.
Last night, co-worker/boss Susan (oooh, Bossy Girl!) asked me to attend the launch of Habitat Dublin with her. Habitat is the Irish/UK version of Crate and Barrel only more expensive. They moved into this great new store and instead of having a Grand Opening, they launched that sucker. Red carpet, invitation only. We got thru that portion of the entry and were greeted by tuxedo clad waiters with trays of champagne. This is how I envision Heaven. After the champagne, we saw the Rum and Coke bar, veered past the Bombay Sapphire Bar and shopped around a little bit. It’s a very nice space; an old turn of the century bank they renovated rather lovingly to display modern Danish pottery and the like. Jazz was belting thru the space when we spotted the canapés being passed around by cigarette girls. Remember those from the 30’s movies? It was cute really. Everything of course served on Habitat trays. After we took our canapés the girl said to take more, it was the last of the appetizers and the food wouldn’t be ready for an hour or so. Bossy Girl and I stared at each other for a moment and then proceeded to politely clean out her tray. I havn't mastered the art of canapés and cocktails, never more apparent than last night. And really, for the number of cocktail parties I’ve been to, you’d think I’d have it down by now. But no. Awkward balancing followed by wolfing of delicate canapé in order to avoid spilling champagne all over the floor. While chomping on phillo dough wrapped shrimp, (why does anyone let me out in public?) we noticed a large number of very tall extremely thin and quite overdressed women who looked like they needed the canapé tray more than us. Evidently it’s best to launch your furniture store with models present. Mind you, they weren’t draped on the sofas or anything, or doing the Price Is Right presentation thing. They were simply picking up (my) guys and swilling (my) champagne. Honestly… And then we noticed Her. Bossy Girl about choked when She sauntered by. Evidently when they decided to throw the party and launch the new line of classic Modern pieces (conspicuously absent I might add, not a Corb chair in sight!) they went with the Roaring 20’s theme and had dancers milling about in 20’s costuming. Presumably they danced later in the night, we only saw one demonstration just before they untied (not cut) the red ribbon. Anyway, one of these lovelies was appointed the Ring Master and was wearing a top hat, black tails, fishnets, satin hot pants and a very shiny black and white bustier. She even had a cane to smack down the rowdies. Oh, and red sequined lipstick. No I wasn’t drunk, she actually had sparkly lips. It’s like Dorothy’s shoes mated with a hooker and then joined the circus. She didn’t do anything either. She wasn’t the one that introduced the speakers, or welcomed everyone into the shop, she didn't even juggle. (she may have jiggled, however) She just wandered around picking up (my) guys and swilling (my) champagne. It was odd. So after the 5 speeches (the roster included both architects, the city planner, the store manager and the Habitat industrial designer who had a very lovely suit) they opened the store officially and then proceeded to point out that, in addition to the bars, there was also a tapas buffet, a seafood buffet, a sushi buffet, a chocolate fountain, and a Guinness bar all scattered around to encourage browsing. They must have spent a bloody fortune on this thing! (Look ma! I can swear in British!) We hit the tapas bar which featured giant prawns, steak, lamb chops, and another wine bar. It was crazy. It was good, but crazy. The one thing they didn’t include were coasters. On my way to the seafood buffet, I realized that people were leaving their empty glasses on the furniture because there wasn’t anyone to collect them, which means that today was a good day to go shopping for floor samples; there were soda and red wine stains all over the place. Bear in mind that they have an entire range of table linens. I for one, would rather loose 50 table cloths and a case of placemats then my entire stock of show furniture. It was unfortunate. The big hit of the evening was the chocolate fountain. Both BG and I were unceremoniously nudged out of the way by other women. They were dipping all manner of fruits, crème puffs, marshmallows… I want one of those in my entry way. Screw water features, give me a chocolate feature! It did dawn on me that in order to meet women the best thing would have been to stand exactly there all night long. But did any of the men think of that? No… It did sort of resemble a bad beer commercial with all the women standing around, frenzied gleam in their eyes. On the way out, I picked up some postcards that entitled us to a free bread/cake/pastry in the bakery on the way out the door. There were hundreds of them (postcard, not bakeries) and the girl didn’t seem to mind how many you handed her. I took one and traded it in for Mediterranean soda bread while BG took home pesto-sun dried tomato focchia bread and an apple Danish larger than my head. As we made our way to the door a woman handed us goodie bags. Honestly, they must have spent more on The Launch than on The Building. Inside was an invitation to a burlesque show/workshop (there is a woman with a Broadway type burlesque show here that’s getting rave reviews) an organic chocolate bar from the company that did the fountain, the new Habitat catalogue of course and a Manolo Blahnik silver shoe horn. Evidently they’re doing the Target thing and getting designers to design products for them. It was quite a party, I must say. I think I’ll never be able to attend a Grand Opening again… Bring on The Next Launch!!
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