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 Quiet time of the year
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| Looking north along Lexington Avenue and 35th Street towards the Chrysler Building. 2:00 PM. Photo: JH. |
Wednesday, January 5, 2011. Cold in New York. Forecasters toying with the possibility of more snow by week’s end.
This is probably the quietest time of the year on the social scene. Many fortunate ones are still away on the slopes of Colorado or Switzerland or the beaches of Florida and the Caribbean.
The good news is the traffic lightens up, so getting around is a little easier. The neighborhood streets are still piled high with the black or transparent rubbish bags awaiting pick-up by the sanitation trucks although now that the snow has melted, they’re getting there. |
| 85th Street between Broadway and West End. Tuesday, 9:00 PM. |
I went down to Michaels to lunch with Lydia Fenet who is Senior Vice President, Director of Strategic Partnerships at Christie’s. I am not interested in a strategic partnerships but more in the lady who also serves as one of the auction house’s celebrity auctioneers.
Lydia’s a tall girl. I’m six-four and she can just about look me in the eye. She’s easy to meet, friendly and direct, a pleasure to know. I’d met her several times, more recently at dinner for Alexandra Lebenthal and her new book The Recessionistas.
I had no idea what her business was. Then I saw her practicing her art (and it is an art) a couple of weeks later at a dinner hosted by Martha Stewart for her Martha Stewart Center for Living at Mount Sinai Hospital. NYSD readers may have seen the item here. |
| DPC with Lydia Fenet at Michael's. |
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I’ve seen scores of “celeb auctions” conducted as additional fundraising at charity galas. They’ve become a habit so commonplace that you can find yourself watching the clock for relief. When Lydia got up to conduct her auction that night, I expected little except possibly dozing off. However, within moments, this girl had everyone on the edge of their seats and laughing. Even I was thinking of bidding on something.
She told me yesterday that the auction houses like Christie’s and Sotheby’s have training programs for this class of auctioneering. It’s an art, a kind of business-cum-comedy stand-up. It’s also part of their “Strategic Partnerships” – offering the service (across the country) to institutions for the fund-raising events, increasing the potential for business. The celebrity auctioneer is selling something but the object (besides raising money) is to entertain. Everyone wins.
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| The witty, quick, and dynamic auctioneering of Christie's irresistable Lydia Fenet, conducting the fund-raising auction that night. |
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Lydia’s been doing it for a few years now. I was impressed the night I saw her in action by her easy ability to relate, sometimes focusing on certain bidders with a humorous chiding or poking so that everyone enjoyed the process. The men in the audience are the most obvious targets for raising the bidding. Often the highest bidders are those who have no intention of buying anything but become engaged by the auctioneer’s focus. Spotting them is part of the auctioneer’s art. I saw this happen that night at Martha Stewart’s. It was not only amusing to watch but very effective: she raised tens of thousands with four items.
She also told me that rarely do celeb auctioneers become salesroom auctioneers. That image is practically owned by men in their black tie or bespoke suits of charcoal grey or black, white shirts, blue ties. The atmosphere where the bidding for a picture or a piece of art or furniture can run into the tens of millions; is no laff-riot. Although I saw in Lydia Fenet, age 33, an ability to cajole and persuade that is very compelling – relaxed, witty and so unlikely as to be disarming.
She was born in Lake Charles, Louisiana, daughter of a trial lawyer, one of four -- two boys, two girls. When the children were old enough, their parents moved to Baton Rouge because the schools were better. Then when her siblings went away to school, and the family would come up to New York during the year to visit them, she was offered the same. She chose Taft, in Connecticut, where an older brother went.
After Taft she went to Sewanee, the University of the South, in Tennessee, which she loved. Taking her junior year abroad at Oxford, a relative who had a connection suggested she take a summer internship at Christie’s. She did and she never looked back; she loves it.
Christie’s has a real asset in Lydia Fenet. Next time I hear she’s leading an auction, I want to be there just for the fun and the amazing results.
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| Some people have kept their Holiday decorations up. This one is on the terrace of an apartment building on 77th Street and Third Avenue. |
Dog Stories. Several years ago, Paige Rense gifted me with some Gift of Life cards from the Lange Foundation in Los Angeles which rescues dogs and cats from animal shelters where their futures bleak and limited if they’re not adopted.
I wrote about it on the Diary at the time, and a friend of mine out there responded by buying some of these cards/donations, one of which she sent to her neighbor Oprah Winfrey. Oprah responded by donating as well and by publicizing the wonderful service.
This year my friends Adam and Penny Bianchi of Santa Barbara sent me this Gift of Life card of Gaby, a Golden rescued from a desert shelter. It came with the following message – written by Gillian Lange of the Foundation. To find out more click here. |
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Other dog stories. Late Monday afternoon I was grocery shopping in the neighborhood when I spotted some dogs tied up outside the stores where their owners were probably shopping. Dogs left outside under the circumstances are prey to assholes who steal them and sell them for use to train the poor besieged pit bulls for dog fights. Think Michael Vick.
Some men who are jerks enjoy this. They call it sport. If they were thrown into the ring they’d call it murder. Whenever I see dogs left outside without supervision in the city I wait until the owner shows up and I wait for the owners’ return and always ask if they know of the danger they’re putting their animals in. |
| This beauty sat patiently outside a supermarket waiting for his mistress to return him to the safety of his homelife. |
| These cuties were very shy in my presence although they were quite lively when another dog passed by. |
Monday afternoon, the owner (a woman) of this beautiful brown Lab told me she didn’t believe her dog would be in danger because he’s a big dog. Stupid or careless? How about both. Then at another store there were these two little cuties -- miniature dachsys, all got up in their canvas and fur wraps. So chic.
When the owner came out and I politely warned her about leaving her pets at risk, she grabbed their leashes and rushed off in a huff without responding, as if I were a nuisance. Ironically I know who the woman is because she’s been on the site attending animal rescue. Although she has a documented reputation for being quite vicious, even abusive, not with her dogs, but with her help. Treating them like dogs? Not to worry; she’s chic. At least the dogs were safe on that day. |
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