Facebook 70s Group - “School Hop” Wimbledon
Report from Mathew Stonehouse (1973-78; Shapwick)
It all started at the Cannes Film Festival during a dinner with Liz Macfarlane (nee Bairstow;1972-76; Southfield ) and her husband George. I was talking about how frustrating it was to go to OM reunions but not see many of my old friends there and suggested we should have a good old-fashioned 70s hop. Liz said “You’d better organise it then” and that was that. I’d recently joined Facebook so I created an event page and invited some of my friends. The guest list grew, as did the number of old friends contacting me and wanting to join in. Initially, I had booked the Paramount Club on the 31st floor of Centre Point which has fantastic views all over London, but when the time came to pay the deposit we had not reached the minimum needed to secure that venue, so I contacted Ghigo Berni (1975-80; Kingweston) and booked out the entire ground floor of his lovely restaurant, San Lorenzo, in Wimbledon. Ghigo was a fantastic host and the night was a great success.
It was amazing at the beginning of the evening to see the 54 faces I remembered from more than 35 years ago walk in through the door - and to see how little they had changed! We all had great fun meeting up again with old friends, some of whom had flown in from New York, California, the UAE and Europe. Peter Martin (1973-77; Joans Kitchen) had brought along a copy of the last time the whole school was photographed in 1974, which we stuck on the wall for people to try and spot themselves and their old school friends. Lisa Trei (1974-78; Ashcott) joined us via Skype from her home in California, although we couldn’t hear her due to the din of excited conversation.
The evening was terrific fun. It was great to see our oldest and dearest friends again. We chatted and danced away the evening, ate some lovely food that was perfectly cooked by Ghigo’s wonderful chef and managed to raise £458 for Cancer Research UK.
Sadly we had to leave at 4.30 in the morning, but some of us were back for a slap up breakfast the next day. We all had such a good time that we’ve agreed to hold another one in two years’ time. If you would like to ‘get your freak on’ and join us at the OM 70s Hop in 2012 then please contact me at mathew@stonehouse.co.uk.
In the photo L to R: Chris Hill, Clare Coleman, Matthew Stonehouse, Coco Giroux, Debby Chivers, Ghigo BerniMelissa Conville, Liz Bairstow and Gina Loutham-Leveson