May 17, 2010 By Carolyne Zinko SF Gate
Among the more intriguing aspects of San Francisco life is that a host can throw a party and invite a chief justice of the California Supreme Court, a billionaire’s wife, a world-renowned symphonic conductor and a former nightclub snake dancer — and they can all get along.
People are still talking about the elegant masquerade ball with an underground club scene edge that interior designer Ken Fulk and his partner, Kurt Wootton, threw for Denise Hale in honor of her birthday and the establishment of a fund in her name at the San Francisco SPCA. The bash for 400 at Fulk’s South of Market design studio on Seventh Street had all the ingredients for the perfect 1990s bondage club party: men standing out front to greet guests, clad in leather vests and pants, bare chests and top hats; bustier-clad women with thigh-high leather boots and riding crops sitting saucily on sofas; and guests in all manner of costumed finery, wearing mysterious masks to hide their identities. No wonder Fulk played off the building’s history in coming up with the theme — it was once the home of the Mr. S Leather leather, latex and bondage toys shop (now on Eighth Street). But lending a white-gloved edge were mini lobster potpies and chocolate desserts by caterer Paula LeDuc; wines galore; and entertainment by chanteuse Paula West, drag queen Fauxnique and a DJ who had guests dancing into the wee hours.
It has been more than a week since the party and Tyler Mitchell, 31, of Connecticut, the new manager of the Wilkes Bashford store, is still trying to wrap his head around the experience, from servers plopping caviar on the back of his hand so he could lick it off — at a serving station under a stuffed giraffe head mounted on the wall — to bacon-egg-and-cheese sandwiches wrapped in paper pockets given to guests as they left after 1 a.m. “At one point I turned to my girlfriend and said, ‘Where the hell are we?’ he recalled, adding, “And I’m hard to impress.”
Hale described Fulk as a modern-day Florenz Ziegfeld. “His party was a Ziegfeld Folly,” she said. “The kind produced on Broadway.” Maybe it should have been called the “Fulk Follies.” But the party was advertised, on invitations, as “Halestorm,” perhaps as much for the riotous atmosphere as it was for the blending of people from disparate walks of life — most of whom would have never been in the one room together unless a tornado, or a Halestorm, blew them together.
There were political leaders and power people, such as California Supreme Court Justice Ron George and his wife, Barbara; Mayor Gavin Newsom; Police Chief George Gascon; Maestro Michael Tilson Thomas and his partner, Joshua Robison.
You had the BYPS (beautiful young people) including Vanessa Getty; Jennifer Siebel Newsom; and Kate Harbin.
There was the established social power, A-lister Ann Getty; the new social power, green living advocate Sloan Barnett; and one of the city’s most important producers, Jo Schuman Silver; as well as interior design stars Roger Thomas (who designs Steven Wynn’s casinos in Las Vegas); Paul Wiseman; and Steven Volpe; along with retail magnate Gary Friedman, who everyone knows as the chief exec at Restoration Hardware.
And last but not least in Hale’s crowd were the costumed cast members of “Pearls Over Shanghai,” two of whom were in the original cast of the Cockettes, and have known Hale for 40 years. The Cockettes was one of the more risque shows to ever hit the San Francisco stage, and New York theater critic Rex Reed made them nationally famous by writing about them after Hale took them to one of their shows, when he was out here in 1971 for Hale’s marriage to Prentis Cobb Hale..
More on the atmosphere: Exposed brick walls and industrial overhead pipes mixed with glittering chandeliers, Oriental carpets, a grand piano, luxurious sofas and high-concept architectural stylings for the bathroom, bedroom and kitchen. Taxidermied animals, white pillar candles and oversized vases of flowers lent a macabre, eclectic touch.
The dress code was black tie, so guests turned out in all manner of tuxedoes and evening gowns to comply. Author Amy Tan wore a golden face mask; Nob Hill real estate agent Joel Goodrich wore an elaborate Venetian mask on a stick; Tyler Mitchell wore a stuffed pink flamingo as a mask and hat, while his girlfriend, Stephanie Oshana, went with an elaborate headdress-style mask.
On a third-floor balcony, Fulk set up a silken tent with pillows fit for a sultan. Guests jammed the outdoors when they weren’t indoors dancing into the wee hours, including Derek Barnes and Hale’s former chef, Ted Hiscox, who’d been in a traffic accident earlier in the week and hospitalized, but made a brief appearance anyway, still bruised and wincing in pain. Novices were agog at the sights and sounds, but even experienced club-goers said it was one of the best parties they had ever attended.
“I had the best time,” said Hale, who — clad in a Ralph Rucci custom design — spent much of the night on landing just inside the outdoor balcony, where she surveyed the party like a captain watching a turbulent sea from behind the wheel of a ship. “For me, it was the best party since I arrived in San Francisco, and the only time I’ve seen people dance all night outside of British designer Nicky Haslam’s ball in London two years ago.”
International jet-setters have all the fun.