The Big House Burlesque Fundraising Party

The Big House is very well known in Auckland, amongst other things, for its big parties and gigs especially organized for Charities.

Everyone loves an occasion for partying in style and the flatmates of the Big House have a special talent to find reasons for fundraising towards good causes.

Since I have been here there had been no such party, all I knew about them was from flatmates talking about memories and recalling how good and successful they were, how many people attended and contributed to raise money for whatever the cause was.

Then a couple of months ago we got presented with a great cause. Liam, one of the flatmates would participate in the Oxfam Trailwalker held over April 6-7 at Lake Taupo, teams of four will be walking 100km together in under 36 hours to help people live a life of hope and opportunities (https://www.oxfamtrailwalker.org.nz/).

He needed fundraising some money so the Big House got together and decided to throw a party for the cause. We had several meetings to discuss the issue, then a date and a theme were decided. It would be a Burlesque Party on Saturday 16 March 2013, $10 ticket on the door.

Once the date and the theme were decided we all started to work hard on making this happening. I had been to many parties before but I had never been part of the “behind the scene” so I was not quite sure what to expect.

It was just very exciting to be part of the organization. Some of the flatmates were in charge of specific areas, others including me and Dom helped a little bit everywhere.

Adria was our awesome party manager, she was amazing at coordinating all the areas and assigning people to different jobs. Karl, the brilliant musician of the Big House managed to get us a stage for the night for free!!!

What a brilliant outcome! Karl, Chris, Harry and Clifford spent almost a whole afternoon to set it up in the Big Room, good work guys! The real work was done the week before the party, that’s when everything really started to happen in terms of getting the house ready for the party-goers.

Karl and his friend Chris, being the resident band in the house, were in charge of the sound system and all the behind the scenes of the bands. Ablow and Lily the artists of the Big House were in charge of the decorations.

They both did an amazing job in just 24 hours, Ablow decorating the Big Room and Lily decorating our dining room that became a chill out boudoir for the occasion. What a beautiful atmosphere you guys created!

Verena decorated the balcony where guests spent a lot of time chilling out and socializing and she created a beautiful welcoming hall for the arriving guests.

I spent time helping Ablow in the Big Room cutting and shaping lamps and with Adria we decorated the staircase in the landing leading to the upper floor.

Everything was different shades and hues of red, purple, pink, gold and black.

Fanny helped organizing the performance of Circus Kumarani which was for sure the best catch of the night (it doesn’t happen every day to have artists from the circus performing in ones living room!).

The live act included a Hula Hoop actl, Acrobats, juggler and a pole dancer! Everyone was absolutely fantastic but the pole dancer was definitely my favourite what an artist/athlete, she made me want to go take lessons.

Amy Richardson-Impey, founder, director and teacher of Pole RevolutioNZ, she is an international performing artist and she also represented New Zealand at Miss World Pole Dance 2009 in Jamaica (www.polerevolutionz.weebly.com). I will definitely go check out her studio!

Karl and his band, The Biiter Pill, also performed at the party together with Tiny Tantrums, Detox Mansion, Jesse Sheehan, Husk, HDSPNS and the duo Jane & Sarah.

It was amazing having all these bands playing at our party. Thank you to Karl, Susan, Lily, Natalie and Julia for helping organizing these brilliant local bands! To finish the night off we had awesome DJ sets going on till around 5am including our flatmate Misha and awesome Dom whom together also worked on the set up of the DJ console and sound!

Fortunately we soundproofed the Big Room to keep noises to a minimum and we let our neighbours know about the party so we did not get any noise control visit during the night!

Beautiful Carolina entertained our guests in the garden with a sexy strip/fire dance moving to the bits of some 20’s burlesque music played by Dom. Very loud applause and wolf whistles went on for her big time.

Carolina you were simply amazing! Unfortunately I do not have any photos of her act, at this point the G&Ts started to kick in…

The garden was spotless for the occasion thank you to our flatmate Tibo whom spent several weeks cutting, chopping and arranging the garden.

Food for the bands and the other performers went on all night. Some of us cooked over two days to get everything ready, Susan, Carolin, Adria, Nick, Dom, Natalie, Tibo and myself. We definitely kept our artists going!

The Burlesque theme was definitely a success! Everyone turned up wearing the most amazing costumes.

I am not really into fancy dress and all that but in the last few days before the party I really got into it and made a rather big effort with my costume.

Everyone looked stunning and I have to say Dom was super handsome in his burlesque gangster outfit!

Our guests were greeted at the door by two of us in turn and there was a big projection of burlesque images at the front of the house, great concession of our flatmate Chris.

What an amazing night, it definitely exceeded my expectations and what a fantastic turn out, we raised a total of $2790 for Oxfam!!!

It was absolutely great, now that is all over I want to organize another party. To see the party growing and coming alive from scratch was a fantastic experience and I am glad to have contributed to the success of it. Everyone in the house did an absolutely amazing job.

Well done team Big House! And thank you to everyone that attended! Without our guest it would have not been a success.