We’ve been out….
Main photographs: Lucas Dawson Photography
Words: Janice Breen Burns
Makeup king Napoleon Perdis arrived like a conquering hero, perched on an ex-military tank that rumbled right up to the front door of Myer’s flagship Melbourne store today. Thousands of city shoppers were snagged by the spectacle, pressing in behind barriers set out along Bourke Street Mall’s tram tracks, cheering as the tank motored by with a model and Mr. Perdis – in vivid blue, skintight, metallic leather fly suit – on top. Some in the crowd weren’t sure who, or why, but applauded anyway: “One of those boy-bands, probably,” a woman explained to her husband as the black tank, emblazoned with Myer and Napoleon livery, swung nimbly into view. “Oh no, it’s not a band, it’s….um…”
An effervescent, irrespressible middle-aged Greek-Australian entrepreneur named Napoleon. Mr. Perdis is renowned for his tan, a penchant for wearing his own expertly applied products, his relentless good humour, glamourous wife and business partner, Soula-Marie, brother and managing director Emmanuel Perdis, and his four striking young daughters, the eldest of whom, at 14, recently began wearing his cosmetics. “A little mascara, a light veil on the lips, and a tinted moisturiser,” her dad confided today.
Napoleon Perdis cosmetics are sold in 23 countries, in many of the world’s best stores including Neiman Marcus and Bergdorf Goodman. In Australia, the main brand (another, diffusion brand, NP Set, is sold at Target and Big W) was available only at David Jones where it was the top selling cosmetics brand and sixth best selling brand overall. In July, however, DJs’ five year exclusivity contract with Napoleon Perdis ended. Mr. Perdis’s decision not to renew that agreement (albeit, to continue supply to David Jones) was reportedly music to Myer’s management.
At the spectacular lunch hosted in the store’s iconic Mural Hall after today’s tank stunt downstairs, CEO Bernie Brooks said $10 million had been allocated to get the Napoleon brand rolling and counters are now in 61 Myer stores. (Myer executives took pains to point out, that’s double the Napoleon counters in David Jones. David Jones countered in its own inimitable style, by locating the Napoleon counter front and centre of its own front entrance, metres from its namesake’s triumphant arrival at Myer next door.)
This was the first of many days that will deplete Myer’s $10 million budget. The guest list, to witness Mr. Perdis arrival, then tuck into Paul Louis champagne and a four course lunch created with remarkable delicacy to echo the Napoleon theme by Big Group included Jennifer Hawkins, Vogue editor Edwina McCann, Harpers Bazaar editor Kellie Hush, Instyle editor Kirsten Galliott and other media heavyweights especially flown in.
The Mural Hall was transformed by Sydney event company Mr. and Mrs. Fish, including commissioned artworks – a pair of giant eyes with exotic feather lashes, an abstract slash “Scarlet-O-Hara” of two wet kilos of Napoleon lipstick – mounted on a skin of inner white walls.
Media heavyweight Melissa Hoyer poses as the “nose” for Mr. and Mrs. Fish’s extraordinary featherlashed eyes.
Lunch was disarmingly pretty: an intensely coloured floral salad with a small perfume pump spray of lemon dressing on the side, a deep magenta risotto with ‘lipstick’ tube garnish, a compact-sized choc tartlet with tiny tube of raspberry gold leaf jam to be applied as required.
Between courses, Mr. Perdis apparently had a quiet word to someone who mattered, and swung his wife Soula-Marie into a joyful Zorba dance as Greek music was cranked louder. And louder. A chain of dipping dancers, including Miss Hawkins, Mr. Brookes and a couple of dozen of those media heavyweights mentioned earlier, now slightly sheepish and occasionally stumbling, stretched from one end of the hall to the other.
No mistaking who had arrived at Myer.
