The Friends Exclusive Preview Night | Taste & Temptation

The Friends have the exclusive opportunity to attend the Opening Night of Taste & Temptation, with special guest curator Dr Matthew Martin. As a specialist in European luxury arts of the 1600s-1800s, Matthew explores how food and drink in the 1700s were more than mere sustenance. A table could display wealth, style, and luxury, be the setting for gossip and social intrigue, and reveal powerful political allegiances.

Each room of historic East Melbourne townhouse, Fairhall, has been theatrically reimagined to evoke the lavish art of eating and drinking in Europe in the eighteenth century. The house museum has been transformed into a series of atmospheric tableaux. Period-appropriate sights, sounds, and scents bring each room to life.

This is a chance to explore The Johnston Collection in an exciting new arrangement and discover the taste and temptations of eighteenth-century drinking and dining. Explore a haven for political rebels; a stylish Continental Kaffeeklatch where women enjoyed coffee and conversation; a sumptuous dessert setting; a baroque dining room laden with silver; and an elegant morning room for the rituals of dressing and hot chocolate.

This is an exclusive event for members of The Friends and invited VIPs.