There is nothing like a crisis to make you realise the unimportance of stuff.

At Humevale, 41 kilometres north of Melbourne, on Saturday, the lesson was more apparent than ever for my friends and I.

The plan was to leave early rather than stay and fight the bushfire. So after untethering livestock, loading the dogs into the ute and grabbing the essentials for her husband and baby, my most fashionable friend Susannah and I were then left with the challenge of choosing what to take from her enviable collection of frocks, shoes and jewels.

Susannah is famous for her shoe collection. During her pregnancy it pained her greatly that she couldn’t squeeze her swollen feet into her $1000 Marc Jacobs boots and her beautiful selection of his flats and pumps.

With plenty of time up our sleeves before the fire arrived to level their home, we picked her favourite pieces to save, including:

  • her Akira Isogawa wedding dress
  • her out-sized south sea pearl engagement ring
  • a crate of costume jewellery
  • three pairs of Marc Jacobs pumps
  • all the designer frocks we could carry
  • a large fragrance collection
  • antique kimonos
  • heirlooms from her grandmother’s dressing table

From the safety of a penthouse apartment in Melbourne’s Parkville, we received the news from the neighbour who stood to fight that my friends' house had burned down. Then came news through that three other neighbours up the hill towards Kinglake West had died.

Susannah, who survived the 1983 Ash Wednesday fires in Macedon has many of her beautiful possessions, but her family have no home. In her words, all that really matters is that her family and loyal dogs are alive and that her 3-month old daughter is too young to remember Saturday, 7th February 2009.

Donate to the Red Cross bushfire appeal
Bushfire Hotline - 1800 240 667
Victorian Bushfire Fund - 1800 811 700
Condolence Book

Main photo: Kinglake range from Doncaster, shot by the Mulherin Family.


Susannah, baby Holly and myself eight hours before the fire approached. Photo: Georgia Metaxas



Smoke plume above Coombs Road, Kinglake West.


The Akira wedding dress. Photo: Georgia Metaxas


Mr and Mrs Cantwell. And that dress. Photo: Georgia Metaxas


The ridge behind Humevale Road, Humevale, 4pm, Saturday 7th February 2009.


The sun through the smoke.



Mount Disappointment at Whittlesea-Kinglake Road.


After the fire.