it's what you want to know
Calling all carnivores! The southern Brazilian steakhouse Fogo de Chao, is now open, the first in a wave of chain restaurants coming to the new King of Prussia Town Center near Wegmans.
Just don’t count on snagging a table this weekend.
Fogo’s GM tells SAVVY he’s already flooded with reservations.
We scoped out the place at Tuesday’s preview dinner; here’s what you need to know:
It’s not often that violent crime comes knocking on the Main Line’s door.
But last week’s brutal murder in Berwyn reminds us that evil can strike anywhere, anytime.
Police are investigating the homicide of a 62-year-old woman in Daylesford Estates, an upscale Toll Brothers’ development that sits between Routes 252 and Route 202 in Tredyffrin.
On June 17, a relative came to check on Denise McDonald Barger and found her beaten to death inside her home.
Coffee geeks are bouncing off the walls this week.
And not just from caffeine.
They’re jazzed because the Main Line’s first La Colombe Café has opened.
At last.
The place is a knockout – a hip makeover of the old Bryn Mawr Garage with soaring ceilings, skylights, original brick and handcrafted wood seating.
Industrial chic done right.
The Main Line never really warmed up to Xilantro, its cold, neon vibe better suited to South Beach than Central Wayne.
But its North Wayne successor, the new Goat’s Beard, well, he’s a whole ’nother animal.
Warm. Fuzzy. Friendly.
Upscale but not uppity.
It helps, too, that the guys behind the Goat are local lads Sean Coyle and Mike “Mac” MacCrory, pals since their Malvern Prep days.
The food biz in his blood, Sean handles operations. (His parents had the TexMex mainstay Binni & Flynn’s; his sister, Meridith, owns Aneu Catering and Paoli’s Fresh Ideas Market.)
Mac’s the money guy – commercial real estate exec by day, goat-herder by night.
The two buddies think they’re onto something.
Smashing, surreal, sublime or silly, the hats turned more heads than the horses at Devon Ladies Day Wednesday.
So, deepest apologies to the dedicated riders in the ring; our eyes were elsewhere.
A record number of hopefuls sashayed before a nine-judge panel.
The maddest hatters told us they’d been perfecting their ensembles for months; others claimed they’d just rustled something up that morning.
Sure, if you say so.
The parade was a study in stunning artiface. A few talked about rising at 4 a.m. for hair and makeup calls – beauty rest be damned.
The Greatest Show on Turf is right around the corner.
Not the Devon Horse Show Grand Prix – although that night’s exploits are pretty swell, too.
No, the spectacle of which we speak comes on Grand Prix Eve when gals from far and wide converge on Devon for the Ladies Day Hat Contest.
What began as a homespun affair with a handful of hopefuls in horsey-trimmed straw toppers (extra points for Devon Blue!) has exploded into a paparazzi-packed proceeding of the first order.
Judge Carson Kressley Presiding. per usual.
(A blue-ribbon Saddlebred competitor as well as a style savant, Carson will be upping his hat game this year, sporting a custom design by la-di-da milliner Christine A Moore. Hey, if she’s good enough for J. Lo and Katy Perry, she’s good enough for our guy, Carson.)
Truly, the whole hat show has vaulted way over the top.
But that’s the fun of it.
If life-sucking depression has a Main Line face, surely it couldn’t belong to tall, athletic, bright and charming Drew Bergman.
But more and more, the 2012 St. Joe’s Prep grad who had everything to live for – but tried twice to end it anyway – has become that face.
His demons at bay, Drew now makes the rounds of area schools, one of 11 speakers for the Rosemont-based Minding Your Mind (MYM) Foundation.
In two years, he’s told his story 250 times – to your son or daughter, perhaps.
And he’ll tell the abridged version again this Thursday at the inaugural MYM fundraiser he’s organized, “A Celebration of Life: Philadelphia.”
When Drew speaks at schools, 15 to 20 students typically line up afterward, seeking a private word with the 22-year old who just gave a public face to the anguish they’ve long felt.
Who just told them it’s OK to speak of the unmentionable.
Who gave them warning signs and coping strategies.
Who bared his soul, shared everything, so they might, too – to someone who can help.
Turning the page on Bryn Mawr, Main Point Books is heading west to Wayne.
Score one for Wayne in the Main Line Downtown Showdown.
Dusty, down-at-the-heels and now officially defunct, Wayne’s old-timey Reader’s Forum will get re-incarnated as Main Point Books in mid-summer.
“I wouldn’t have moved if I hadn’t been offered this specific space,” says bookseller Cathy Fiebach, a Wynnewood mom who will pack up Bryn Mawr after a three-year run and open on North Wayne Ave. the last week of July.
‘Cause Wayne’s got what Bryn Mawr’s still pining for: foot traffic.
“People understand how to park in Wayne and how to walk around town,” she tells SAVVY. “Bryn Mawr doesn’t quite have that worked out.”
Hallelujah! It has been SAVED!
A few months ago, we told you about the fire ’n brimstone fight to spare Strafford’s old Covered Wagon Inn from CVS’ wrecking ball.
Well, Praise Be: preservationists’ prayers have been answered.
CVS’ developer has submitted a new plan to Tredyffrin Township that keeps the small circa 1780 building – once the Covered Wagon Inn, now Thomas Moser Fine Furniture – standing tall at the corner of Old Eagle School and Lancaster.
We all thought Villa Maria and Shipley alum Jessica Knoll was living the dream.
Her debut novel, the Gone Girl-esque thriller, Luckiest Girl Alive, was an award-winning bestseller.
Lionsgate optioned the movie rights with Reese Witherspoon (!) to produce; Knoll wrote the screenplay.
Her publisher – Simon & Schuster, no less – green lit a second novel, due to drop in spring 2017.
Noll had made it in magazines, too, landing coveted senior editor jobs at Cosmo and Self.
Oh, and she was attractive and happily married, too.
At 32, she was, well, the luckiest girl alive, right?
No and yes.
Two weeks ago, Jessica Knoll dropped a bomb.
She published an essay admitting for the first time that the horrific gang rape in her novel was based on her own experiences.
