Fun in Baghdad by the Bay

Los Angeles designers Tony Duquette and Hutton Wilkinson can’t count the hours they labored to create decorations for a most unconventional Arabian Nights Ball on Friday night at the Palace of the Legion of Honor Museum in San Francisco.

Dodie and John Rosekrans hosted the occasion for the debut of their granddaughter Jenica Rosekrans. It was far from the usual white-flowers and long-gloves affair. Rather, Duquette/Wilkinson fashioned an “Oriental Bazaar on Baghdad by the Bay.” The duo also is decorating a Paris apartment for Dodie Rosekrans, who flew around the world to collect decorations for the Baghdad evening.

The museum site was definitely first choice. After all, it was built by John Rosekrans’ grandmother, the late Alma Spreckles. For the party, the museum facade was transformed with a backdrop painted to resemble the Amber Palace in Jaipur, India. Tents and tablecloths were appliqued and embroidered in the bazaar in Delhi, and the waiters’ gold coats and turbans were ordered in Jaipur.

There was a battalion of carved Indian soldiers with rifles and a red lacquered bandstand for Peter Duchin and his Orchestra.

Gordon and Ann Getty flew in guests from Europe. Angelenos fortunate to be invited planned their costumes for months. Peter and Kacey McCoy were potentate and princess. Their son Patrick and daughter Shane also attended. Diane and Mark Hopkins McNabb were dressed as nabobs during the Raj. Penny and Adam Bianchi went as Salome and the head of John the Baptist. More in Oriental costumes were Noorna Eversole and her son and daughter-in-law, Harry and Mary Eversole, Eleanor Phillips Colt, Shannon and Pamela Clyne and Tom (in black tie and turban) and Travis Kranz. Actress Sharon Stone dressed as a maharani. Duquette wore a tunic of gold brocade with a headpiece covered in turquoise. Wilkinson came dressed in blue in the style of Ningbo, China, with wife Ruth in beaded pink gauze and a jeweled headdress from Burma.

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Portuguese Bend: Fall’s equestrian high spot--the 39th annual Portuguese Bend National Horse Show--is looming for the weekend after Labor Day, Sept. 6-8, at Ernie Howlett Park in Rolling Hills Estates. To Pacific Coast equestrians, the show is the site of the Pacific Coast Horse Shows Assn. Horsemanship Medal Finals.

Betty Learned, the first president of the Peninsula Committee Childrens Hospital, and friend Betty Davidson fought the first-year prediction in 1958 that “horse shows don’t make money.”

The critics were wrong. The committee has raised more than $3 million for the hospital. And will raise more for its continuing commitment to gene therapy, cancer biology and molecular biology research.

According to tradition, members lasso their husbands and children to hammer and paint at work parties before the show. Everyone learns to flip hamburgers in style.

Betsy Miller, show chairwoman, has been working with current Peninsula Committee President Terry Durham since February. Miller’s daughter, Molly, will participate in the show on her horse Palet. Shannon Rooney, 7, a third-generation member of a longtime Portuguese Bend Horse Show family and granddaughter of Jody Murdock, mayor of Rolling Hills (and a committee member for 14 years), will also ride.

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Coronet Debutantes: While a harpist played, the Coronet Debutante Ball Board announced its debutantes at a mother-daughter luncheon at the Bel Air Country Club.

To be presented in November: Elizabeth Abramson, Christina Caan, Carolyn Carlson, Kathleen Citron, Maureen Dowling, Amanda Kaplan, Katherine Kuchenbecker, Holly Markovitz, Courtlan McClintock, Kelley McEachern, Courtney Miller, Alison Neiman, Kara Older, Emily Olsen, Christina Purdy, Allyson Rinella, Elisabeth Salz, Sloane Starke, Robin Ure, Caroline Van Oosterom and Adina VerBrugghen.

Applauding were Barbara Harris, board president; Janet Walther, president of the National Charity League, Los Angeles Founder chapter; Linda McCann, ball director; and Eileen Nahigian, luncheon chairwoman. Ball proceeds will help support the NCL-USC Teacher Center.

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Sundown Festival: Metropolitan Associates have been picnicking on the grass at Pasadena homes all summer, rubbing on insect repellent and watching favorite films as the stars come out. There’s one more affair to go. On Saturday, Kittie and Bill Ballard, and Peggy and Jim Class will host before the film “Funny Girl.” Proceeds will help underwrite a Los Angeles Music Center Opera performance and fund bus transportation for San Gabriel Valley students who attend.

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Elsewhere on the Social Circuit

Honors galore: Lea Ann King, past president of the Volunteer Center, South Bay-Harbor-Long Beach, received the Gloria Deukmejian Founder’s Award at the National Community Service Conference in San Francisco . . . Hal Kanter was saluted by the University Women of the University of Judaism at their 30th annual author-artist luncheon . . . The Braille Institute Auxiliary honored retired attorney Max G. Kolliner at the Riviera Country Club for his 17 years of dedication as a reader for the blind.

* Ellie Cortese chairs the celebration Monday night for the opening of the newly renovated Bally shop at South Coast Plaza in Costa Mesa. The event benefits the AIDS Services Foundation/Orange County . . . The goal to keep musical theater in Ventura County a reality at Cabrillo Music Theater energized last week’s “Stagelight Serenade” dinner auction . . . L.A. Dodger pitcher Tom Candiotti and his wife, Donna, teamed with the LAPD Swat Unit for a game at Dodger Stadium celebrating kids at Orthopaedic Hospital. More than 800 children and parents attended.

* Mary Lou Loper’s column is published Sundays.