Glamarama drama: Sydney millionaires turn on each other in beachside soap opera
An exy beachside soap opera is bubbling in one of Sydney’s most exclusive communities. James Weir meets the characters, who are all breathlessly gossiping.
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Manicured fingers are being pointed in one of Sydney’s most exclusive beachside communities, as the plot thickens with a whodunit that seems like it could be ripped from the pages of any Liane Moriarty novel.
“I’m worried they’ll turn me into the enemy,” frets one frail resident.
“The blame that’s going on [in this suburb] is so embarrassing and puerile,” says another long-time denizen of Tamarama, the exclusive coastal neighbourhood made up of narrow streets on a rugged ridge that overlooks one of the harbour city’s most wild and dazzling coves.
The area — tucked between the more famous Bondi and Coogee beaches — has recently been a playground for pop stars Dua Lipa, Rita Ora, Hollywood director Taika Waititi and is the home of current It-girl Vanessa Fennell. Now, it’s the setting of a mystery involving million-dollar views and has escalated up to the government and police – leaving residents shaking in their Gucci loafers.
“It’s the destabilisation of Tamarama,” says one well-preened neighbour, who lives up to the “Glamarama” moniker that has been bestowed upon the suburb.
This resident is talking about the battle that has erupted after seven 30-year-old palms were poisoned at a mansion on Thompson Street, which has left the owners of the trees and some of the neighbourhood angered.
Other neighbours feel the issue has been blown out of proportion.
“It was a mass of ugly foliage. Just ugly,” the local says. “They’re palm trees — not like an old oak. They’re not like a normal tree. It’s just … weeds. The whole thing is contemptuous. If my palm trees died, I’d be really happy.”
The poisonings are suspected to have happened at night around the week of New Year’s. News only hit the press last week, with the owners of the under-construction property telling media their builders reported the matter to police.
A large canvas sign has now been erected and strung across the palm carcasses: NO TREE SHOULD DIE FOR A VIEW.
“They’re very odd. Who puts a sign up like that?” the posh neighbour gripes. “Go buy another four-wheel drive and grow up.”
The owners also suggested in The Daily Telegraph that the culprit was a local, hoping to maximise their own ocean outlook.
“We’re upset that someone trespassed onto our property and drilled holes into the trees and killed them,” the owner, who wished to remain anonymous, is reported to have said.
“Sydney is all about the view. Who has the right to destroy trees for an uninterrupted view? A view is more beautiful with trees in it. They bring birds. They break up the vista a bit.”
The neighbourhood is now in a tailspin, with many whispering their own theories.
“Everyone’s hurting [in the area] because they feel indicted,” the outraged local says. “We wouldn’t kill a palm tree. We’re more concerned about the stock market than we are about a pine cone.”
This resident stops mid-sentence and lets out a sigh.
“Ugh f**k! I just broke another pair of Tom Ford sunglasses!” they blurt. “Never again!”
‘IT’S VICIOUS’
“It’s The O.C meets Sydney,” says brash buyer’s agent Simon Cohen about the Aussie cove that permeates the same hazy expensiveness as the Californian utopia depicted in the Y2K TV series that centres around a group of rich teens.
“You’re seeing a lot more younger, wealthy people moving to Tamarama because it offers that exclusive beach lifestyle – you wake up, hop in the ocean and then you’re back home. You can swim, surf, suntan and then be in the city in 15 minutes.”
One resident who lives near the dead palm trees sighs.
“We raise an eyebrow at the new money coming in,” she says.
“We had a 25-year-old buy an $11 million house down the road.”
She might be referring to Elliott Watkins – the YouTube gamer who bought a $9 million mansion in 2020 from Hollywood cinematographer Peter James.
“Heaven forbid he might make too much noise with his gaming,” another neighbour mocks. “Next minute, they’ll say he’s cracking the roof tiles.”
This resident says “nothing obnoxious happens in this neighbourhood”.
Then they pause, reconsidering the statement before offering some local lore.
“One time, a person in a nearby street got upset at someone doing a DA, so they got eggs and threw them at three properties because they couldn’t figure out who was doing the development.”
But back to the dead palms.
“…These trees have been the subject of some contention in the past,” says Peter Hannigan from The Tree Fellas, an arborist who has worked with the owners of the property for over a decade and throughout the extensive renovations.
“Numerous complaints have been received … over the years from [people] complaining about these trees blocking their views.”
He says this resulted in the trees’ owners applying to Waverley Council to “have the trees listed on the Council’s Significant Tree Register, so that they would be protected permanently” but were told the palms didn’t meet the criteria.
He says the owners are “devastated about the almost-certain loss of their trees”.
“The owners of the property contacted us recently to come and assess these mature palms as they were declining, and drill holes were found at their base,” he says. “We have undertaken two rounds of treatments to try and save [the] trees, but it is not looking promising. As is so often the case after poisoning, by the time the symptoms are noticed, it is usually too late to reverse.”
News.com.au understands a new Bangalow palm with a mature height of six metres was proposed in 2023 to be planted near the same area as the now-poisoned palms. Some residents are on record as having expressed concerns about obstructed views, but these worries were dismissed.
New South Wales Police initially told news.com.au it “isn’t aware of this incident” involving the poisoned palms but later said the matter was reported in February and no offenders were identified, after reviewing footage.
“Some people will stop at nothing,” says JCorp Construction’s Jason Natoli, who has been building luxury homes in Sydney’s east for 25 years.
He built the Vaucluse mansions of radio host Jackie O Henderson and celebrity publicist Roxy Jacenko.
Henderson is now underway with a new build in Clovelly, a short stroll from the Tamarama palms. While she has managed to secure the ever-elusive waterfront view, her new neighbours have complained about their outlooks being potentially obstructed, though their concerns have seemingly been waved by council with the approval of the DA plan.
Natoli – whose own view of nearby Bronte Beach is blocked by a 40-foot Norfolk pine – says trees in the eastern suburbs “have a target on their backs”.
“If you can get rid of two trees, you could make millions of money doing so,” he says. “All of a sudden you’ve got gun barrel views of the harbour – and you’ve made three or four million dollars.”
The struggle has become so fraught, Waverley mayor Will Nemesh tells news.com.au council will consider a motion at its next meeting at the end of the month and “formally call on the State Government to increase fines for illegal tree vandalism”. Following the Tamarama poisoning, he dubbed the crime “inexcusable”.
Vandals can currently be hit with a $3,000 fine per poisoned tree, with punishment jumping to $110,000 for some endangered plants and skyrocketing to as much as $1.1 million if it’s taken to the Land and Environment Court.
“The thing is, the fine is not big enough and basically you can get away with killing a tree,” says one resident.
Ashley Horry, a tree technician from Pretty Palms Tree Services who has been operating in Sydney’s east for over a decade says poisonings are “rampant”.
“If a tree is dead, it’s classed as dangerous, so you don’t need approval to cut it down,” he says.
When it comes to the Tamarama palm gravesite, locals say they don’t know who to believe. And the whispers are only getting louder.
“Who did it?” says another curious neighbour. “That’s the question we’re all asking. It’s vicious. Vicious.”
WHY WEREN’T THE UGLIER TREES POISONED?
“Everyone’s walking on eggshells trying to prove, ‘It’s not me, it’s not me!’,” says the Tamarama resident with the broken sunglasses.
They say there are bigger fish to fry in the neighbourhood. … Like, even uglier trees.
“You look at the Norfolk palm on the other end of the street and you think, ‘Isn’t THAT an obliteration?’ Let’s be honest.”
A man who lives on the strip agrees.
“It’s sad to hear. … But why didn’t they poison the trees further down? They look worse,” he says.
One woman within eyeshot of the dead trees has a harsh message.
“You can put this on the record. Feedback from locals is clear: The trees were hideous and just weeds anyway, so why wouldn’t you knock ‘em over?”
Tamarama is a unique pocket of the universe where humble, working-class residents – some of whom bought their shacks on this rugged coastline for $5,000 in the 1960s and ‘70s – are now being dwarfed by unmemorable million-dollar mansions.
“They’re trophy houses. They’re not homes,” says one long-time Tamarama owner, who has repeatedly batted away lucrative offers from developers.
The sound of crashing waves below her modest home sound like a whisper on this orange afternoon.
In January, advertising executive David Droga got approval to build a castle on a site he bought in 2022 for $45 million. The designs for the house were labelled by Waverley Council as “menacing”.
“This used to be a family neighbourhood,” says a different homeowner, who has seen the transformation over decades.
“Now, cashed-up people have moved in and you don’t see them. They just drive their car into their garage, catch the lift up to their mansion and disappear.”
Originally published as Glamarama drama: Sydney millionaires turn on each other in beachside soap opera
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