At the San Francisco Opera’s opening ball Friday, the only thing more expensive than the $2,000-a-plate dinners were the sumptuous black-tie gowns and flawlessly executed plastic surgery on display.
The annual event is the opera’s biggest fundraiser, and it doubles as a sort of coming-out — or coming home — for San Francisco society. Emerging from their vacation homes in Tahoe and Napa, the city’s toniest residents don their black-tie best and descend on City Hall for a night of Champagne and schmoozing.
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While slightly less attended than previous years, the 2025 gala featured boldface names like iPhone designer Jony Ive, philanthropist Maria Manetti Shrem, Mayor Daniel Lurie, and of course, Dede Wilsey — one of the last grande dames of San Francisco society and the top sponsor of the evening.
Also in attendance was Rep. Nancy Pelosi, who told guests that she and her husband, Paul Pelosi, attend every year as part of their anniversary celebration. Two attendees were overheard telling her they’d taken bets on whether she’d wear 4-inch heels again this year, after fracturing her hip in December.
Reader, she did.
The evening started with a red-carpet photo shoot outside City Hall, where opera supporters and philanthropists Dagmar Dolby, Gretchen Kimball, and Marieke and Jeff Rothschild posed for photographers, while a newly married couple tried to find somewhere else to take their wedding photos.
Attendees were ushered through a security line and into a walkway lined with green velvet curtains, leading to a giant, illuminated jester’s mask — a nod to the performance to come. They sipped Champagne and nibbled on deviled quail eggs and caviar before sitting down for dinner: grilled double lamb chops and buckwheat morel risotto, with orange panna cotta for dessert. Colorfully dressed jugglers circulated among the crowd.
The party then moved to the opera house for Giuseppe Verdi’s “Rigoletto,” the first opera of the season. The balcony levels were lined with intricate pink-and-purple flower garlands, some arranged in the shape of the comedy and tragedy masks, provided by designer Stanlee Gatti. An opening video featured SF Opera General Director Matthew Shilvock, Opera Association President Jack Calhoun, and Board Chair Barbara Wolfe talking up the opera’s ambitious forthcoming season — and, of course, the importance of its donors.
The performances — including the SF Opera debut by tenor Yongzhao Yu — were mesmerizing, but the two-and-a-half-hour run time, coupled with the warm theater and the plethora of Champagne, clearly had an effect: A few patrons, who shall remain nameless, were spotted almost dozing off.
At intermission, guests gathered on the mezzanine for even more Champagne and to admire one another’s festive attire. (One stand-out: board member Aquila Farrell’s sculptural black-and-white number, which rose like an orchid around her face.) Circulating among the crowd were KTVU reporter Betty Yu, former SF Chief of Protocol Maryam Muduroglu, early Facebook executive Marne Levine, and philanthropist Pam Preston.
A slightly younger-leaning crowd returned to City Hall after the performance for the after-party. In the south room, DJ HeyLove spun reggaeton and mid-2000s dance tracks, while in the north room, a cover band performed what can only be described as wedding bangers. A few dozen sufficiently lubricated guests got down to the music, though one remarked that this was why he prefers the annual ballet gala: More dancers in attendance means more people dancing.
By 12:30 a.m., the catering staff was cleaning up, and guests were spilling out into the night, carefully coiffed updos buffeted by the strong wind. It may have been early by gala standards, but no one could risk being out too late: They’ll have to do it all again at the SF Symphony gala a week later.