London’s superrich continue to dig deep for charity
The superrich in the UK are continuing to give record amounts to charity, confirming London as one of the most important centres for philanthropy in the world.
Saturday night saw the third annual Raisa Gorbachev Foundation event in London that managed to raise £2.9m for the charity, which raises money for children fighting cancer, and Marie Curie Cancer Care.
The event attracted celebrities from the world of fashion, art, music and business, as well as a sprinkling of Hollywood stars, and raised nearly £2m more than last year, firmly establishing it as one of the biggest annual charitable evenings in London.
Held at Stud House, the palatial London home of Russian billionaire Alexander Lebedev, who also hosted the evening, guests departed with large sums of money, including a £250,000 for a dinner for two with Mikhail Gorbachev, the former president of the Soviet Union and the founder of the Raisa Gorbachev Foundation.
Actor Hugh Grant vied with the likes of Orlando Bloom, fashion designer Stella McCarthy, and Lebedev’s son, Evgeny, for a work of art by top British sculpture Anthony Gormley that eventually went for £220,000.
Lebedev, who owns around a third of Russia’s biggest airline, Aeroflot, said: “We want to make this annual dinner broader in scope than some of the other similar fund-raising events help in London – attracting givers from a wide variety of backgrounds,”
Two nights before the annual Ark children’s charitable dinner took place in London, attracting the cream of London’s finance community and raising more than £25m, just slightly down on last year’s total.
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