The Latest Status Symbol: A Personal Vineyard
Everything you need to know about the Hamptons micro vineyard phenomenon; plus, the quiet return of Amagansett fashion legend Tiina Laakkonen; and a shoplifting epidemic.
Fourth of July is the weekend with the highest alcohol consumption of the year in the United States, and that certainly feels true out east. That booze level paired with a rip-roaring thunderstorm resulted in full-on chaos on Saturday. When the storm drove yachters off their boats in Sag Harbor, they were turned away from dockside white-tablecloth restaurant Le Bilboquet (owner Philippe Delgrange told the New York Post they “did the best they could”). At Sunset Beach on Shelter Island, four simultaneous fights broke out, originally over a girl, but also battling for valuable rain cover. One bystander told me the show “eclipsed the fireworks.” We have some secret footage over on our brand-new paid-subscriber chat. Mind you, Shelter Island’s official fireworks aren’t until July 11, so hopefully this isn’t a taste of what’s to come then.
Over at Lulu Kitchen & Bar in Sag Harbor on Sunday, a group called East End for Peace and Justice staged a protest against the restaurant’s owner, Apollo Global Management CEO Marc Rowan. The billionaire Rowan also owns Duryea’s Montauk and Duryea’s Orient Point under his hospitality umbrella Montauk Asset Holdings. The activist group, which describes its gathering as a “weekly vigil demanding an end to the U.S.-supported Israeli occupation of Palestine,” chanted anti-Rowan rhetoric while distributing “menus” supporting their position.
Somewhat calmer was Jane Lauder Warsh’s Independence Day dinner party at her oceanfront home in Wainscott. The former Clinique president turned pet-longevity investor, whose birthday is July 1, goes big on Fourth of July, with an elegant dinner for over a hundred—including dogs and ladies who lunch—right off the beach.
In today’s THC, for paid subscribers, a deep dive into the personal microvineyard phenomenon; the return of Amagansett fashion legend Tiina Laakkonen; and a shoplifting epidemic.
