With many thanks to Mother Nature for bringing us an early summer, it is the perfect time pop in a for a pedicure ­­— then show it off with a hot pair of strappy sandals. It’s easy to incorporate the season’s fierce color trend into your footwear with these multicolor Jimmy Choo embellished boho sandals. Pair these chic shoes with white skinny jeans, a bright and flowy top and a light jacket for the perfect spring look, or try them with ankle-cropped pants for a trendy evening out.

Jimmy Choo embellished sandals, Picardy Shoe Parlour, Mequon and Brookfield.

Enjoy five courses at Dream Dance Steak accompanied by wines of Napa Valley’s Hill Family Estates during a special wine dinner at 6 p.m. April 5. The menu by chef Matt Baier will feature dishes such as lamb ragout prepared with Zahtar tomato sauce and polenta, and bacon-wrapped venison made with house-cured bacon. Wines will include Hill Family Chardonnay, Hill Family Merlot, Hill Family Cabernet and Hill Family Origin. Ryan Hill, son of founder Doug Hill, will be on hand to talk about his family’s vineyard and wines.

The dinner costs $65 per person, not including gratuity. Arrival for the event is set for 6 p.m., with dinner scheduled at 6:30 p.m.

Dream Dance Steak is located inside Potawatomi Bingo Casino, 1721 W. Canal St., Milwaukee.

Callen-Bartolotta Get Cookin’

Does your dinner menu need some inspiration? Bartolotta Restaurant Group chefs will be preparing three courses during cooking demonstrations at the Callen kitchen and bath showroom in Muskego.

Mark Schmidt, executive chef, Bartolotta Catering at Pier Wisconsin, will prepare Three-Way Chicken — Pan-Seared, Braised, and Fried on April 14 and Nicholas Wirth, chef de cuisine, Bacchus Restaurant will present Spring Salad Selections on May 12.

The Saturday events will be held from 10:30 a.m. to 12:30 p.m. at Callen, W13131 Janesville Road, Muskego. The cost is $25 per event or $40 for two people per event, with half of the cost going to the National Kidney Foundation of Wisconsin. Space is limited and reservations are required. Call (414) 529-5509 or e-mail christi.pryor@callenconstruction.com.

Wine Online

Jessica Bell’s My Wine School is offering a series of free, live, interactive online wine tastings for wine explorers. Spring offerings feature wine-related topics on everything from “Red Hot Rioja” to “Georgian Wines: Not from the Peach State.”  In addition, Bell and co-host/chef Karen Bell, discuss the latest news in the food and wine world over a “glass and a nosh” during “Foodie Fridays With a Side of Wine.”

For more information, go to www.mywineschool.com or contact Bell (312) 972-WINE (9463).

SURG Goes American in Brookfield

The SURG Restaurant Group is busy preparing for the opening of a new restaurant in Brookfield, where Charro once operated. (SURG recently closed the Charro on Milwaukee Street as well.) The name of the new Brookfield restaurant is still a secret, but the menu, designed by company executive chef Aaron Patin, will feature American cuisine and include steaks and seafood. The restaurant will feature a wood fire grill to “add an extra zest of flavor to some of the post popular American dishes,” according to SURG co-owner Omar Shaikh.

Restaurant decor is being described as comfortable and rustic, geared to families and business diners. One wall will be an entire front of a barn. The bar will include six big-screen TVs. The new restaurant will be at 17800 W. Bluemound Road.

Design Finds

Have high design tastes but a low design budget? Sisters Jill Wightman and Jennifer Morales say professional interior designers have long shopped consignment shops for fabulous finds. The two have opened The Ottoman Society, a fine furniture consignment shop in Elm Grove. They say it’s on point with the broader retailing trend of “the blurring of tastes,” in which everyone shops everywhere ­ ­— discount retailers, online, outlet malls, department stores and consignment shops.

Consignment shops drop the price of an item by 20 percent if it hasn’t sold in 30 days; 40 percent after 60 days. Sellers split the sale price with The Ottoman Society 50/50. The shop is located at 13408 Watertown Plank Road. Call (262) 786-1786 or go to www.theottomansociety.com.

Beauty comes in all shapes and sizes. Take Dutch makeup artist Ellis Faas, for example, who developed a collection of makeup inspired by the colors that exist naturally in the human body. The advantage? Each shade can flatter and complement any skin tone. And if the unique liquid formulation colors aren’t enough to pique your interest, the applicators will — each color is housed in chic bullet-inspired pens. Check out this cutting-edge line at Blush Beauty in Milwaukee and Mequon.

As an art lover I am fascinated with the process of making art. One of the oldest and most labor-intensive methods is the bronze sculpture casting process. Fortunately in Milwaukee we have a wonderful foundry, Vanguard Sculpture Services, which specialize in fine art bronze casting and is open to the public.

Founded in 1996 by a group of sculptors, Vanguard Sculpture Services is Wisconsin’s only fine art bronze foundry, making everything from custom architectural hardware to large-scale sculpture. Housed in an expansive art deco industrial building in Milwaukee’s 30th Street Industrial Corridor, it is an ideal setting for sculpture casting and fabrication. The interior is bathed in natural light from the large clerestory windows above, and an abundance of beautiful plants provide a pleasant working environment. Owners Beth Sahagian and Michael Nolte oversee the foundry operations and employ a staff of skillful artists.

As a medium, bronze is valued for its strength, malleability and propensity to hold details. Since the fourth millennium B.C., sculpture, tools, weapons, building materials and countless other items have been made with this versatile metal.  It is also an ideal medium for sculptors who want to make their work in multiples.
To cast a sculpture in bronze, the client needs only to provide a drawing, photograph or sculpture, if available. Artists employed by Vanguard translate the idea into a sculpture model. Once approved by the client, a mold is formed and a casting is made using the lost wax process. Molten bronze is poured into the mold and cools. A master metal finisher welds the bronze pieces and grinds the seams for a flawless surface. Lastly, a patina of chemicals is applied for the desired finish. According to Sahagian, “preserving the artist’s intent and facilitating their vision is the ultimate goal.”  

Notable commissions at Vanguard include a monumental gorilla family by Mike Mooney for the Milwaukee County Zoo; Beth Sahagian’s Acqua Grylli for the Milwaukee Riverwalk; the Harry Whitehorse Effigy Tree for the Goodman Community Center in Madison; Jill Sebastian’s screens at the UW-Madison Student Union; and life-size Rev. Joseph Kentenich sculptures for the Schoenstatt Sisters of Mary.  

In addition to casting, Vanguard cleans and maintains bronzes around the state. Recent projects include the sculptures on the roof of MSOE’s Grohmann Museum, Miller Park and the Milwaukee Riverwalk. 

Vanguard recently opened an exhibition gallery that features the bronze sculpture by 20 artists who cast at the foundry. A future show will include Bernard Roberts, a prolific Wisconsin sculptor and Vanguard client who recently passed away.

Bronze pours take place weekly and are open to the public by appointment. Foundry tours are also available by calling (414) 444-5508. Visit the website to see more pictures of projects and the casting process at www.vanguardsculptureservices.com.

My son, Jake, is the race director for a new run taking place in Madison on April 14. To say I’m proud would be an understatement as he readies for the inaugural Race to Erase MS. He’s not only taking on the challenge during his final semester at UW-Madison, he’s taking an active role in the fight against multiple sclerosis, a disease that afflicts his father. It’s become a personal war for him.

He is on the board of the organization called Going for Ten Thousand (GF10k) that formed in January 2010 by UW student Becky Hall.

It started as Hall’s personal goal to raise $10,000 for the National Multiple Sclerosis Society-Wisconsin Chapter’s annual MS150 Bike Tour. Today, GF10k is about fighting for the 10,000 people in Wisconsin fighting MS. To date, it has raised more than $40,000.

We can all learn something from these young men and women who are actively doing something to fight this debilitating illness.

So get off the couch, put on your running shoes and get ready to take part in the battle against MS by signing up for their 5k run. You can choose to participate in the April 14 race taking place at the UW Natatorium in Madison or the April 22 race taking place at Arrowhead High School in Hartland. Be a real warrior and do both!

The Race to Erase MS is open to runners and walkers of all ages and abilities. Refreshments and a T-shirt are included with registration fees. Prizes will be awarded to the top male and female in each race. For more information and to register go to www.goingfortenthousand.com.

It’s time to choose a parting gift for your tailor.

Mayfair Mall has just resolved all of your “I can never seem to find clothes that fit me perfectly” nightmares. The new (and free!) Me-Ality kiosk, located in the lower level of the mall’s south wing, uses safe, low-power radio waves to measure a person’s body in approximately 10 seconds. Me-Ality then identifies the fit, style, design and cut that best matches an individual’s measurements. But wait: It gets better. After your scan, Me-Ality will produce a personalized shopping guide in 10 minutes, and recommend the best sizes for your frame and where to find them in the mall. You can also create a Me-Ality online profile, which will provide you with personalized, updated shopping guides as new brands, styles and sizes come into the mall.

Shoppers will have the opportunity to test out the new kiosk, sip on refreshments and enter a drawing for a $50 mall gift card noon-4 p.m. Friday, March 16, and Saturday, March 17.

Now that’s a high-tech fitting room.

Neda Stevic’s Shady Lady jewelry line.

Beautiful. Smart. Generous. Entrepreneurial.

How do you describe Neda Stevic?

A freelance model and hair and makeup artist by trade, Stevic, who recently launched a jewelry line called Shady Lady, defines herself as a fine artist first. “Modeling and makeup artistry followed as natural extensions of my artistic self-expression,” she says. That artistry has led to modeling and styling campaigns for major clients, and now she will be guest emceeing this month’s New Orleans Fashion Week, where her unique Italian- and Spanish-inspired jewelry designs will be debuting on the runway.

You can find Stevic’s designs locally at Dragonfly Boutique, 1117 E. Brady St., where a portion of the sales benefit the Milwaukee Animal Rescue Center. In addition, Stevic is donating half of all proceeds from jewelry sales at New Orleans Fashion Week to a local charity to assist in ongoing rebuilding efforts after Hurricane Katrina.

M: Tell us a bit about your background.
NS: My mom and dad both came to the United States from Serbia, so I am a first-generation American. In fact, few people know that English was my second language, and my mom and I learned English together after I returned from school each day. While I constantly travel all over the country for work, I’ve lived in Milwaukee all of my life. While studying at UW-Milwaukee, I had the life-changing opportunity to live in Sevilla, Spain, for a year for a study-abroad semester. The experience in Spain was so wonderful that I returned to work there as a model, this time in Barcelona. I used both of my college degrees in Spanish literature and psychology as a Bilingual Employment Counselor at The Women’s Center, a domestic violence center and shelter). Now, I earn a living as a model and also a hair and airbrush makeup artist.

M: When did you first begin designing jewelry?
NS: I began designing jewelry and creating paintings, which I sold on consignment at a boutique on the East Side, during college. These artistic outlets were such a source of relaxation for me, and helped pay for my tuition as well.

M: What were your inspirations for the collection, and why is New Orleans Fashion Week the perfect fit to debut your designs?
NS: When I moved to Sevilla for my semester-abroad study program in college, I had the opportunity to travel all over Europe. The Spanish Gothic cathedrals, paintings by the great masters in the Louvre Museum in Paris, and glass blowers and colorful Carnival masks in Venice fascinated and inspired me. The Gothic influence is prevalent in the black arch-designed lace on my neck corsets, which mimics the cathedral architecture. The colorful feathers in all the pieces are heavily influenced by my experience in Venice. New Orleans Fashion Week is the perfect fit between the collection and perhaps the most European U.S. city, which is world famous for its street performers, Mardi Gras, blues and jazz music, art, Creole food, Colonial Spanish and French architecture and very rich culture.  

M: What materials do you use to make your unique designs?
NS: The materials I use for my pieces change constantly, depending on what I come across in boutiques, estate sales or in my travels. Recent materials used in my pieces include lava rocks, Swarovski crystals, Gothic lace, ostrich feathers, and vintage brooches and pins. Since each piece is custom made, it’s a unique, one-of-a-kind repurposed piece with a new twist on vintage jewelry, rather than a mass-produced product. Also, there is such variety in the collection, from very subtle pieces to neck corsets with feathers curving up around the face, and cascading down the neck. Many pieces can be worn from day to night, and easily transform from a brooch to a hairpiece with the hair comb attachment.

Mia Five Pocket Flares by Hudson Jeans.

No, it’s not a rumor … It’s time to set aside the skinny jeans and add a little “flare” to your wardrobe. If you were brave enough to save some of your flared jeans over the past five years, it’s time to break them out and brush off the dust. Or, venture online to simonoliverclothing.com and order a pair of Mia Five Pocket Flares by Hudson Jeans. Dress them up for a Friday work day with a blouse and some Steve Madden heeled boots, or dress them down for weekend errands with a pair of Rachel Zoe flats, a basic T-shirt and cardigan. (Did I forget to mention how flattering this cut is on EVERY body, or how incredibly comfortable they are?) Men looking for the perfect pair of blues from a variety of top-notch brands can head into the Simon Oliver boutique (featuring men’s clothing only) at 318 E. Silver Spring Drive, Whitefish Bay.

Sip a signature “Pink Drink” and raise money for Gilda’s Club of Southeastern Wisconsin from 5 to 10 p.m. Friday, March 9, at The Hamilton, 823 E. Hamilton St., Milwaukee. BVEN Boutique’s trunk/fashion show for charity, featuring celebrity host Dear Ruthie, will offer a new selection of women’s clothing from American designers and popular lines like Stop Staring, Design Todays, Salaam, Testimony, Luxe Junkie, Young at Heart, Angelrox, Nailah’s (Milwaukee-made), Elizabethian, Fidji and Spring Step. Cancer survivors will also model select fashions. Prices range from $25 to $200. Spend your money like you mean it, because 5 percent of the show’s sales will be donated to Gilda’s Club, helping those affected by cancer. RSVP to Heidi at heidi@bvenboutique.com.