Roving Eye

On Thursday, it was the turn of Ashley Shoes to open their doors to the public. All day they served wine and snacks to the women who dropped in to check out theirrange 8212; comprising of shoes which are both trendy and comfortable.

On Saturday, there were quite a few familiar faces at the opening of Usha Mirchandani8217;s Designer8217;s Paradise. The interiors for this tiny store packed with formals, semi-formals, casuals and prints, have been designed by Lali Dhawan. Poor woman, even in her moment of glory, people insisted on introducing her as David Dhawan8217;s wife8217;. Among those who turned out for the quiet afternoon affair were Rima Jain, Haseena Jethmalani and Rhea Pillai-Dutt 8212; who stood out from the crowd in her elegant all-white salwar kameez and subdued demeanour. Since the store was to be inaugurated by a film star, a long wait was expected. Karisma Kapoor, who was meant to do the honours, kept everyone waiting till well after 2.00 pm, but show up she did. At long last.

By Saturday, most stores were open and the mall was declared officially open. But if you decided to go, you made a BIG mistake. It took an hour just to get from Breach Candy to Tardeo. And eventhough they have a car park for 500, the mall could not cope with the amount of people who visited. It seemed that the whole city had decided to check out the mall, and obviously the Pirmals were not equipped for that sort of deluge. We suggest you wait until the teething problems have been sorted out before you check out the place.

What an act!

The Oberoi Hotel, along with Johnny Walker, hosted a supper theatre event on Tuesday. And close to 200 guests showed up at the Regal Room for Raell Padamsee8217;s second run of Games People Play. Two one-act plays on the complex, convoluted relationships that men and women play out had the audience either laughing out or sighing in agreement. The first play starring Soni Razdan and Vinay Jain was well-paced and intelligently interspersed with music by the Beatles. The second half shown after a delicious meal served quietly and efficiently was a Harold Pinter play, this time with Soni and Aly Khan. Unfortunately, either due to the length of the enactment or ageneral waning of attention, the second play did not go down too well with the audience. But all in all, the evening was well organised, the food wonderful and the ambience ideal for a night of culture. But perhaps the crowd was what made the difference. All of theatre8217;s bigwigs were present. There was Alyque Padamsee who had dashed from the Foutainhead launch to attend his daughter8217;s opening. Sitting right up front, literally propping up the stage, were Sabira Merchant, Farid and Tanaaz Currium, and Sumanto Chattopadhyay and Devika Shahani the duo from Hosi Vasunia8217;s Barefoot in Mumbai. Sitting further down where Anish and Vineeta Trivedi with Parthiv Kilachand.

Kelly8217;s cream

On Thursday night, model Kelly Dorji decided to try his hand at bar-tending at Silly Point, the Sports Bar in Phoenix Mills. Kelly, who has been back in the city for a few months, has become quite a popular face behind the bar due to his ability to whip up mean and deadly cocktail concoctions. Knocking back his potentpotions were Lara Dutta, Anish Trivedi and Dalip Tahil. Kelly8217;s graph seems to be on an all-time high. He is turning his hand to anchoring with a show on Star Movies, with Lisa Ray, called STARbiz, every Sunday. In addition, his reputation as a photographer is also gaining ground. Shooting portfolios for a while now, Kelly is going to shoot Pantaloon8217;s latest campaign.

And finally8230;

World Cup fever may have died down and cricket ads on the idiot box may have vanished without a trace, what with the dismal performance of the Indian cricket team 8212; but there was a winner that emerged from the debacle. Liquor manufacturer UDV has made it to the Guinness Book of Records. UDV tied up with Bombay Dyeing and The Indian Express to make a banner for the Indian cricket team wishing them the best of luck. With 1.2 million signatures on a 10.15 km long and 1.36 m wide cloth, this banner has been officially declared the world8217;s largest banner. To quote the ex-captain M Azharuddin: quot;The boys UDV playedwell.quot;