At the Santa Rita 120 event: 1. Aine O’Brien & Laura Woods; 2. Darren Cawley & Aoife Mitchell; 3. Kathryn Thomas. (Pix. Leon Farrell)
The Merrion Hotel was the location where Santa Rita 120, the well-known and well loved wine from Chile, announced Darren Cawley as the inaugural winner of the Santa Rita 120 Local Hero award. Darren is awaiting a kidney transplant and works tirelessly to promote organ donation.
Familiar faces at the after party in The Cellar Bar were RTE’s Vivienne Traynor one of the judges of the award, actor Michael Hayes, Kathryn Thomas, Laura Woods, Danielle Hayes and Dublin City Sheriff Brendan Walsh. Also there were Etain Boyd, Paul Trainer of The Dubliner, Carol Hunt and Naoise Nunn (who launched the Mindfield festival this week, Tripod, end of the month).
Darren and his sister Martina Cullen, who nominated him, have both won trips of a lifetime for 2 to Chile. Darren has also won €10,000 for his nominated piece of community activity which is the European Transplant & Dialysis Games in Dublin this summer.
While we’re on the subject of Heroes, don’t forget the Heroes for Haiti ball is on in the Thomas Priory Hall at Bewleys in Ballsbridge this Friday night – plenty of social heads and celebs dressing up as their heroes for a great cause.
