Man about town Ricardo Simich brings you Society Insider. This week, did Brad Pitt stay at the Mowbray mansion while in Auckland? Where has Peter Huljich relocated to? And why is NZ hairstylist to the society set Grant Bettjemann selling up and moving on?
Society Insider: Did Brad Pitt stay at Mowbray mansion; Peter Huljich moves to Queenstown; Grant Bettjemann, hairstylist to the rich list, moves on
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Polly Markus has made a big announcement; was Brad Pitt staying at the Mowbray mansion?; Peter Huljich has relocated; hairstylist Peter Bettjemann - who worked for more than a decade with Trelise Cooper - is moving on from his self-named salon. Photo / Herald composite
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Pitt’s co-stars include veteran US actor J.K. Simmons and Canadian actor Anna Lambe, who is currently in the Netflix comedy series North by North. Set in an Arctic village, Lambe stars in the series with Kiwi actor Jay Ryan.
While based in Queenstown, Pitt rented an extremely private luxury residence, with room for his security, just outside Arrowtown.
Pitt’s Auckland digs remained a mystery but speculation reached fever pitch in Coatesville that he has been based at Mahoenui, the $40m home of Nick Mowbray and beauty entrepreneur Jaimee Lupton, dubbed The Toy Mansion in a nod to the Mowbrays’ multibillion-dollar toy company, Zuru.
The timing of Pitt being in Auckland coincided with Mowbray and Lupton being out of the country. The couple have been travelling throughout the US since early April with their 1-year-old daughter Noa.
With their Coatesville mansion empty, it’s believed Pitt used Mowbray and Lupton’s home as his Auckland base.
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Lupton told Society Insider she could not comment if Pitt had been staying at Mahoenui, but another Coatesville mansion owner confirmed that they – and other locals – had been approached as possible Auckland bases for Pitt.
Society Insider has been told the confidentiality agreements Pitt’s advisors made people sign during his time in New Zealand are ironclad.
One ultra-wealthy Coatesville resident told Society Insider: “People that said they represented Pitt asked if our home was available for him while he filmed in Auckland. It wasn’t. I believe a mansion down the road was asked too,” a Coatesville local said.
The Mowbray mansion would have been a suitable base for Pitt and his team. The property has 12 bedrooms and numerous living areas – plenty of space for the star and his security team, which one source told Society Insider was the biggest security detail ever seen for a film star working in New Zealand.
The mansion boasts state-of-the-art high-tech gadgets and artificial intelligence throughout the home and its surroundings, and its sprawling grounds are great for security and helicopter landings. Over the past few weeks, Pitt was spotted either arriving on set in Kumeū by helicopter or being driven to the studio in a black 4WD.
The only sighting away from the studios was at a McDonald’s drive-through in Kumeū, where Pitt was approached by a young fan who later posted the video on Facebook.
Pitt, known for his love of architecture and design, would be a fan of the mansion renovations Lupton did with Rufus Knight, the founder of Knight Associates – an architecture and interior design studio.
Mahoenui also has a wellness centre, specially created by Lupton, which, with its gym, has numerous regenerative devices for staying fit and healthy.
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Entertainment industry sources tell Society Insider that production on Heart of the Beast at Kumeū Film Studio finished on Friday.
It is understood that Lupton and Mowbray returned to Auckland on Saturday.
Peter Huljich’s new life in Queenstown
Fresh from making headlines last week as the Pushpay executive convicted of insider trading, Society Insider can reveal Rich List son Peter Huljich has a new life in Queenstown.
Huljich, 49, the youngest son of Chris and Connie Huljich, who have a reported wealth of more than $550 million, is understood to have made the permanent move to the tourism mecca last year.
Sources tell Society Insider that Huljich and his wife, Sarah, think the adventure wonderland is the perfect place to raise their three young children.
Property records show Huljich owns a nearly $4.5m home in Arthurs Point, purchased in 2022.
The five-bedroom, country-style home has immaculate grounds, privacy and panoramic views of the lakes and mountains.
Records show Huljich still owns a more than $5m modernist home in Auckland’s Mission Bay.
Sources say Huljich and his family are ensconced in Queenstown life, and their children are enjoying their schooling and their surroundings.
The couple have been seen out and about enjoying the local social scene and were among the A-List guest list at the opening of the Michael Hill Queenstown store in November.
Huljich declined to comment to Society Insider about his new life in Queenstown.
Huljich’s father, Chris, built his own wealth after he and his two brothers, Paul and Michael sold their food manufacturing business Best Corporation in the 1990s.
In the 2000s Chris and Peter started working together and now have their private equity business Christopher & Banks Limited.
Chris and Connie have just completed a multimillion-dollar rebuild of their Ōrākei mansion, which a property expert says would now make it one of the top 10 most expensive homes in Auckland.
With their youngest son of their four children now based in Queenstown, Connie and Chris have only one child living in Auckland.
Eldest daughter, Liz, who has a family with surgeon Duncan Ferguson, has a large home near her parents, estimated to be worth more than $10m.
Their two other children are based in Sydney. Their youngest, Rachel Cooper, a former Miss New Zealand, lives in a palatial mansion in Sydney’s Eastern suburbs with her husband, property marketer James, and their family.
Oldest son Jason has an equally impressive home in the Eastern suburbs with his wife of five years, Lucy.
Jason now has the largest profile in the family – he is a co-founder of Centuria Capital Limited in Australia, which collectively oversees over $20 billion of assets under management.
Peter Huljich made national headlines last week over his insider trading conviction. His name has been suppressed since he was charged by the Financial Markets Authority (FMA) in February 2022, and stayed suppressed after he was convicted the following year and sentenced to six months’ community detention and a $100,000 fine.
Two weeks ago, the Court of Appeal dismissed Huljich’s appeal against his conviction, rejected his request for continued suppression and increased his fine to $200,000.
Huljich said last week – via a statement through his PR agency – that while he was disappointed with the outcome of his appeal, he acknowledged the judge’s findings.
“The Court of Appeal has recently declined my appeal, I now intend to seek leave to appeal to the Supreme Court,” Huljich said in the statement.
“I maintain my innocence and am hopeful that eventually I will be cleared of wrongdoing.”
Hairdresser to the rich and famous Grant Bettjeman selling up and moving on
Grant Bettjeman, hair stylist to the Eastern suburbs society set since the 1980s, has sold his exclusive salon, Bettjemans, on Ōrākei’s Coates Ave.
Bettjemans has been owned by Grant and his wife Phif, both 70, since 1999.
The long list of Rich Listers known to be regulars includes Cara Pollock-Turner, wife of Comfort Group co-owner Craig Turner; Connie Huljich, wife of Chris, of private equity business Christopher and Banks Limited; and Jan Farmer, wife of property mogul Trevor, who has a reported wealth of $950m.
Former Real Housewife Gilda Kirkpatrick is another regular and Bettjeman says it’s been lovely to have all of the daughters of his gilded clients stay with him and his team.
“Many of our clients didn’t need shampoo at home, such was their frequency of a blow dry at the salon,” says Bettjeman.
He tells Society Insider that he and Phif decided the time was right to hand the salon “to someone younger with more enthusiasm,” although it was essential the new owner understands the brand and the clients.
Long-serving salon manager Amber Evans has taken ownership and will keep the salon’s name – and the man himself – as a stylist for the next two years, aiming for a “seamless transition” for clients and staff.
Bettjeman describes his job as half-hair stylist and half-confidante, saying he got to know many of his clients “probably better than their husbands”.
“Sure, we had demanding and tricky clients, but they weren’t divas, they were all just juggling life,” he says.
At times, he says, staff had to navigate the sensitivity of having someone’s ex-wife in the salon at the same time as the new wife who replaced them in their former husband’s affections.
“Staff did their best to keep them separate,” Bettjeman says. Things got trickier when wives one, two and three were all in the salon at once.
One of his standout memories is having four Dames in the salon all at once – Dame Jenny Gibbs, Dame Pieter Stewart, Dame Kiri Te Kanawa and Dame Lesley Max.
“It was quite something to have four Dames, with all of their achievements sitting in a row, all with their own unique style,” he says.
The late Lady June Hillary was also a regular, and Bettjeman did call-outs for visiting Dames – Dame Shirley Bassey, Dame Edna Everage and Hollywood star Jane Seymour.
“I went to their hotels, Dame Shirley and Jane were fabulous in real life,” says Bettjeman.
“Phif and I had worked with Barry Humphries (Dame Edna) decades earlier when we lived in South Africa,” says Bettjeman.
Bettjeman is one of five boys who grew up on a farm in Piopio, southwest of Te Kūiti. He dreamed of being a hairdresser since his teens, a dream he fully realised in 1970 – aged 16 – with a job at Michaels of Remuera. In 1975, he was styling the hair of Phif Fortescue, and the pair fell in love.
The couple left for London in 1976 and for four years Bettjeman worked the scene, taking inspiration from famed hairdressers Vidal Sassoon, Toni and Guy and Trevor Sorbie.
Bettjeman ran the salon in department store Bourne & Hollingsworth, with 30 hairdressers, while Fortescue worked in Harley St as a dental assistant.
In the 80s, the couple left London and spent time in Cape Town, where they became engaged, as well as Asia and Surfers Paradise, where they married.
Returning to Auckland, they opened their first salon in Kohimarama called Hairkraft in 1984 and had their two children, son Dion and daughter Petra, now 40 and 37 respectively.
Bettjeman says a “midlife crisis” in the mid-90s led to him and Phif selling the salon and their house and taking their children travelling in Asia, before ending up in Siena, Italy.
There, they met renowned Italian stylist Fabio Gentilini, who Bettjeman says transformed his approach to styling.
“My craft became creating beautiful, sexy, luxurious hair not set by trends,” he says.
In 1999 they came home and opened Bettjemans, inspired by top luxury Italian salons, and recruited some of the city’s top hairdressers. Many have gone on to open salons of their own and gained their own well-heeled following, such as Sasha Lenski who has opened his own salon in Parnell, catering to the society locals.
Bettjeman has won his fair share of awards and has been on the judging panel of the New Zealand Hairdressing Competition, where he also presided as chairman, but he says his biggest career highlights have been working with acclaimed NZ designer Dame Trelise Cooper and publisher Paula Ryan.
He teamed up with Cooper for more than a decade to create the looks for her annual NZ Fashion Week runway shows; and with Ryan on her Simply You brands, where he regularly worked with model Kylie Bax. Bettjeman describes her as “one of his favourite people in the world”.
Bax’s eldest daughter, Lito, is now a star hair artist at Bettjemans and is slowly building her society clientele.
Over the next two years, the Bettjemans will enjoy a slower pace, enjoying their fabulous home in Ōrākei and having decent breaks at their equally chic bach in Piha, as well as visiting son Dion, who is based in Italy with his own growing family.
A good week for…Polly Markus
Celebrated Kiwi foodie Polly Markus has revealed she is pregnant with her first child with long-term partner Matt Gordon, the associate director of sales and leasing at Bayleys Real Estate.
The Ponsonby-based pair worked together in commercial real estate at Bayleys, Auckland Central.
Markus, 34, has mixed her passion for cooking with her time at Bayleys, as well as taking time off from real estate to become a crew chef on superyachts. Markus’ passion for food comes from her late father Les, who introduced her to exotic foods from a young age.
Markus created a successful blog and built a huge social media following with Miss Polly’s Kitchen. She shares her recipes with her more than 80,000 Instagram followers, and has published two cookbooks, Miss Polly’s Kitchen in 2022, and Simply Delicious last year.
Gordon, 37, is known as Flash Gordon at Bayleys where he has worked in commercial leasing for more than 13 years, turning over $100m for the firm.
Gordon has leased to some of Auckland’s most well-known businesses, including Rich Lister Anna Mowbray’s ZEIL offices on College Hill.
Markus shared the news while on a working trip to Spain, where she has been exploring the towns of Mallorca, accompanied by some girlfriends, tasting market produce and checking out fabulous restaurants, all in the name of creating and translating them into new recipes.
Gordon is home in Auckland working real estate deals.
From Spain, Markus told Society Insider that the couple will reunite soon, and they can’t wait to welcome their little girl later this year.
“She’s the best thing I’ve cooked,” Markus says.
Party people of the week
Luxury Fashion Lunch
Australian stylist to the stars Gab Waller was the guest speaker for The Luxury Network New Zealand at Bistro Saine at The Hotel Indigo on Albert St.
Hosted by The Luxury Network’s Sofia Ambler, Cecilia Lambie, and Scarlett Wood, and MC’d by broadcaster Laura McGoldrick, the sold-out lunch featured Los Angeles-based Waller, talking about fashion and her international career.
Guests included Rich Lister Amber Edgar and daughter Sammi; Sutcliffe jewellery owner Brent Sutcliffe; media buyer Jane Hitchfield; Zoe Williams, founder of Zoe & Morgan; and State of Mind Jewellery’s Molly Bayly and her sister Bella.
Also in attendance were Influencer and Pals co-founder Anna Reeve; Founder and Director of ODD management Liz Delaney; beauty editor Hélène Ravlich; fashion stylists Georgette Pollock-Johnston and Aki Curtis; Together Journal’s Greta Kenyon and wellness coach and model Esther Cronin.
Summit style in the city
Après-ski took over Auckland’s Britomart Square last Friday as VIP guests were treated to a sneak preview of the newest store of Kiwi merino performance-wear brand Mons Royale.
It’s the brand’s seventh store opening and the first in the North Island, with six others already in Wānaka, Queenstown, Europe and North America.
Guests were treated to coffees, hot chocolate, sweet treats and pastries, all served on top of two breakfast ‘charcuter-skis’, while they perused the brand’s latest collection within the store’s fit-out, which nods to the outdoors.
Mons Royale co-founders Hamish and Hannah Acland shared the brand’s backstory in front of the crowd, including ZM host Clint Roberts, broadcaster and former Silver Fern, Courtney Tairi, international rugby referee Ben O’Keeffe as well as influencers Mandy Duncan, Simone Anderson and Tarryn Donaldson.
The doors then opened to a huge queue of customers eager to check out the store, as well as its real-time updates and snow reports on the slopes of Tūroa, Treble Cone, Whistler and Innsbruck.
Ricardo Simich has been with the Herald since 2008 where he contributed to The Business Insider. In 2012 he took over Spy at the Herald on Sunday, which has since evolved into Society Insider. The weekly column gives a glimpse into the worlds of the rich and famous.
