Star-Spangled Summer
RRL + Mate Gallery spark the season
Photography: Meg Sandu for Montecito Country Mart
Last Friday evening, Santa Barbara Magazine’s fashionable friends gathered for an appropriately themed Ranch-meets-Hamptons party to welcome Ralph Lauren’s RRL brand at Mate Gallery at the Montecito Country Mart.
Double RL is the newest addition to Mate Gallery’s selective American heritage brands, which include L.L.Bean and Brooks Brothers. RRL has stores in the Hamptons, Aspen, Melrose Avenue, and Malibu, and is now available in Montecito at Mate Gallery.
Hosted by global polo ambassadors Nacho Figueras and his wife, Delfina Blaquier, who have been part of the Lauren brand family for more than 20 years, the part-time Santa Barbara residents during the summer polo season also brought their kids Hilario, Artemio, and Alba to enjoy the stylish soirée and shopping.
The crowd swelled as the sun set on the Montecito Country Mart, and the festively lit Mate Gallery shone on a pair of vintage trucks, which flanked gatherers relaxing on hay bales and enjoying the passed glasses of Folded Hills Rosé and overflowing wicker baskets of white hydrangeas mixed with plates of delicious samplings from neighbor Oat Bakery.
Event partner Homer kitted out the back of the vintage Defender and C-J7 Jeep with buttery leather goods. The brand was founded by Terry Pillow, former CEO of Chaps Ralph Lauren and more recently CEO of Tommy Bahama.
Guests also included cohosts Santa Barbara Magazine’s Jennifer Smith and Gina Tolleson, Kathy Hilton, Victoria Jackson and Bill Guthy, Jeffery Alan Marks, Jordana Brewster, Zoë de Givenchy, Sarah Magness, Bryan Graybill, Robert and Alecia Seidler, Dewey Nicks, Lee Stanton, Amanda Masters, and artists Olivia Joffrey and Tasya Van Ree.
