2 days Ago By Melissa Singer
Steve Bennett is peering over my shoulder. But he’s not trying to attract a waiter’s attention or even the eye of someone at another table. Instead, he’s assessing what people are wearing.
“Clothing is going through a very strange period ...
You’re the only well-dressed person here,” the 77-year-old veteran of the Australian fashion industry and founder of Country Road quips. Country Road founder Stephen Bennett at St Kilda’s Saint George. Credit: Eddie Jim I am flattered though a tad sceptical about having praise heaped upon my simple outfit – jeans, canvas sneakers, T-shirt, khaki blazer – and challenge Bennett to spot someone else in the room who is “serving looks”, fashion slang for well-dressed.
He nods to a woman at a nearby table wearing a Breton-striped T-shirt, and we agree she passes the pub test. Only, we’re not technically in a pub, but at Saint George , the refurbished dining room at the Saint Hotel on Fitzroy Street, in the bayside suburb of St Kilda. The former pub, which opened in 1915, has a relatively new tenant in celebrity chef Karen Martini, who jets by to say hello to her old friend, Bennett.
For a brisk autumn Friday, the place is buzzing. “There are lots of ladies who lunch,” Bennett observes as he sips a double Jamieson on the rocks, while I nurse a Hemingway Cooler mocktail, flavoured with grapefruit and cherry. Fritto misto – flash-fried seafood – at Saint George.
Credit: Eddie Jim The catalyst for our lunch is the 50.
