Sally Ridge

Sally Ridge (born 1970) is an interior designer, television personality and socialite from Auckland, New Zealand.

Career

Ridge has been a television presenter on several shows dealing with interior decorating, including the TVNZ television series, Home Front^[1] and Changing Rooms. She was also one of the celebrities, on the 2001 New Zealand series of Celebrity Treasure Island. Along with Anita Simpson, she ran 24 Simpson Ridge, an interior design company. ^[2] She formed clothing company James & August Ltd. in 2004. This failed, and went into liquidation in May 2010. The liquidation report filed with the Companies Office stated that the company owed $1 million. ^[3]

An art college graduate,^[4] Ridge has also done work as a painter^[5] and fashion designer, having created some fashion items with Verge New Generation. ^[6] In 2011 Ridge was writing a weekly crafts column for a woman's magazine, and making appearances at various events.

In May 2011 Ridge took part in a fashion show in Christchurch, also featuring model Nicky Watson, to raise money for the earthquake relief as part of the successful Rise Up Christchurch Telethon on Maori Television.^[7]

On Wednesday 12 September, 2012 at 7.30PM Sally Ridge, along with her eldest daughter Jaimie, premiered their much-anticipated reality TV show entitled "The Ridges" on TV3 (New Zealand). The channel has touted them as the "most talked about mother and daughter duo in New Zealand; tabloid fodder and twitter targets who are famous for being famous." With promotional material asking: "But who are Sally and Jaime Ridge…really? Vacuous, shallow, attention seekers who grace the Sunday gossip columns week after week? Or simply misunderstood? A dysfunctional mother/daughter relationship? Or are a close parent and child who love spending time together?". The show begins filming where Sally has just purchased a rundown, mouse-ridden 13 bedroom boarding house and needs to get it liveable for her family of four children to move in, while Jaime is invited to fight in a high profile boxing event. With just five weeks to train.^[8]

During promotion of the show the Ridges have been labelled as attention-seekers, but Sally has responded by saying "For some reason people think we're desperate fame-seekers but 90 per cent of the time when we're in the public eye it's either for work or not of our doing. It's the media choosing to write about us". Sally stated that despite their desire to be part of the show, she excluded her three youngest children for fear of accusations of exploitation.^[9][10] Parore later claimed Sally intended the children to be featured until his lawyer wrote to TV3, and Ridge claimed to have banned son Boston from appearing.^[10] An early review published in the Herald on Sunday's Spy column called the first episode - in which Sally renovates their new home and Jaime models lingerie - as "laugh out loud funny".^[11] Ratings dropped steadily after the first episode, and the show did not return for a second season.

Personal life

Ridge married former All Black and rugby league captain Matthew Ridge in 1988, at the age of 18. Together they had two children, a daughter, Jaime, and son, Boston before they broke up in 2001. Shortly after the break-up Sally appeared in a provocative photo spread for men's magazine Ralph.

In 2003 Ridge started a relationship with ex-international cricketer Adam Parore, with whom she had two children. Ridge and Parore were involved in a controversial real estate scandal when they sought to demolish a 100-year-old house and replace it with a modern building.^[12] And also in 2009 the couple were embroiled in a $1 million leaky homes lawsuit. ^[13] They broke up in 2010.^[14][15] Ridge and her daughter, Jaime, took Mr Parore to the High Court at Auckland in September 2013 seeking a 50 per cent shareholding in the former international cricketer's Small Business Accounting (SBA) company and the back-payment of unpaid dividends. In his judgment Justice Murray Gilbert said "Ms Ridge's claim fails at the first hurdle". He awarded Mr Parore scaled costs of $73,232, plus disbursements of $31,610, and a 50 per cent increase for any costs incurred after January 1, 2013.

References