To say the Irish evening at Sotheby's Bond Street auction rooms in aid of the John Crown Breast Cancer Research Trust was a success, is putting it mildly. The sell out event not only raised £384,000, it also raised consciousness about the latest findings relating to the disease, including Dr Crown's pioneering high dose chemotherapy/transfusion treatment. Dr Crown has recently returned to Dublin as a consultant oncologist to St Vincent's from Sloan Kettering in New York.
The evening began with a champagne reception in the ground floor halls. Tedcastles John Reihill and his wife Ann, publisher of the Irish Arts Review, Brown Thomas's Hilary Weston, financier Dermot Desmond, high flier Tony Ryan, Coolmore Stud's John and Susan Magnier and actress Lisa Hogan (who features in this month's Tatler as well as John Cleese's sequel to A Fish Called Wanda) were all part of the genially irreverent crowd who refused to acknowledge repeated calls to dinner.
Finally an organiser pleaded that there was a very hungry royal waiting outside to make her entrance, which she couldn't do of course until everyone else was seated. Guests bowed to protocol and so it was that guest of honour Princess Alexandra was saved from certain death by starvation.
She was not the only royal presence - Viscount and Viscountess Linley were also there, he having donated an oak mirror to the after dinner auction which fetched £4,500. The auction also included the chance to spend 10 days at a villa in Mustique and four nights at Lismore Castle in the Duke of Devonshire's private wing. Intriguingly, there were also two stud opportunities - a night with Thunder Gulch (gulp) went to Brigitte Smurfit for £50,000.