Out & About
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Best Wishes For Long House Reserve
After a day of living well on the East End, guests arriving at LongHouse Reserve’s fund-raising gala in East Hampton Saturday wrote down their fondest wishes on pastel-colored pieces of paper and attached them to a tree, as part of “The Wish Tree,” which artist and musician Yoko Ono created for the event.
“I wish I had $50,000 right now to give to the person I love the most in the world,” landscape architect Jack deLashmet of Bridgehampton, N.Y., wrote.
Ms. Ono, who is the widow of John Lennon, said her own wish was world peace, which she has been working for, through her art and music, since she was 17. As an example, she mentioned her all-white chess set sculpture, “Play It By Trust,” which is on view in the gardens of LongHouse Reserve.
The wishes did not stop there. The founder and resident of LongHouse Reserve, textile artist and collector Jack Lenor Larsen, accepted well wishes throughout the evening in honor of his 80th birthday on August 5.
An architecture professor at the University of Pennsylvania, Patricia Conway, conveyed her wishes with her granddaughter, Xandria Schaeffer. Miss Schaeffer held eight balloons, and Ms. Conway none. “That’s 8-0, for his 80th birthday,” Ms. Conway said.
Mr. Larsen made clear his wish: to ensure that the 16-acre nonprofit museum and garden he created 15 years ago to show the relationships between art and nature — the grounds currently display sculpturesby Dale Chihuly, Sol LeWitt, Roy Lichtenstein, and Buckminster Fuller, as well as day lilies and Japanese snow bells — lasts well beyond his lifetime.
“When I walk through this place, I realize it’s still a growing garden. I have large ambitions. … I’ve just been at a 100-year-old garden with magnificent trees. I am resolved that we will start now thinking in terms of long-term planning here.”
Guests seemed eager to help Mr. Larsen fulfill his wish, and indeed, did their part, raising $350,000.
“I’ve always thought of him as my teacher. He knows where all the danger is, where all the bodies are buried, and what it’s like to be a totally civilized Renaissance man,” a Pulitzer Prize-winning playwright, Edward Albee, said.
“Jack has created the most beautiful man-made thing in East Hampton,” designer Daniel Young said. “This will be a legacy for humanity.”
The official birthday greeting came from the co-presidents of Long-House Reserve, Angela Mariana Freyre and Dianne Benson. They instructed guests to light the white candle on their chocolate cake and make a wish for Mr. Larsen.
