By Cara Waters
Flemington Racecourse’s exclusive Birdcage enclosure is even more decadent this year, with the marquees getting ready to pour – or shower – the champagne and dole out caviar at the Melbourne Cup carnival.
With cost-of-living pressures appearing to ease and inflation at its lowest level since 2021, the purse strings have been loosened in the extravagant tents constructed each year at Flemington.
The Penfolds marquee is pouring 2020 Grange at the Melbourne Cup carnival.Credit: Eddie Jim
At the unveiling of the branded marquees on Thursday morning, G.H. Mumm literally showered guests with champagne, Tabcorp shot confetti out of cannon and Lexus put on a fireworks display from its first-floor balcony.
The Birdcage’s exclusive marquees are invitation-only, but Victoria Racing Club members can enter the general enclosure, and the public can buy their way into the VRC’s Lucky’s marquee for $1785 a pop.
Tickets to Lucky’s are already sold out for the first three days of the carnival.
Inside the red-and-white G.H. Mumm marquee, the champagne house – which has featured a swimming pool and a full-size yacht in previous marquees – has recreated the interior of a private jet.
The faux jet is not serving your typical airline food. Instead, luxury butcher Victor Churchill is supplying steak frites made from wagyu beef, a last-minute replacement after Mumm cut ties with Reine & La Rue following restaurateur Alan Yazbek’s charge for displaying a Nazi symbol at a pro-Palestine rally in Sydney.
G.H. Mumm prestige manager Chris Sheehy said the brand wanted to go bigger and better this year after setting high expectations.
“This is the biggest Birdcage in terms of square feet that we have ever had,” he said. “We’ve actually gone bigger, and we’ve built an observation deck, and we’ve got the champagne, we’ve got the caviar. We are keeping that level because that is the expectation our customers have; we have not stepped back from it. We need that moment of celebration and happiness.”
The Penfolds marquee overlooking the parade ring boasts the longest bar in the Birdcage at 14 metres.
The winemaker is serving signature cocktails and tastings of 2020 Grange, which retails for $1000 a bottle.
Guests will be given a silk scarf featuring artwork by Rikki Day, with a stylist on hand to help them accessorise the scarf with their outfits.
Chief marketing officer Kristy Keyte said that while cost-of-living pressures have had an impact on consumers, Penfolds had seen “premiumisation” occur.
“So people may be drinking a little bit less, but they’re choosing moments where they’d like to indulge,” she said. “I think this year, at the spring racing carnival, is one of those moments.”
Lexus launched its Melbourne Cup carnival marquee with a grand piano, ballet dancer and fireworks. Credit: Eddie Jim
Penfolds also has a secret bar within the Birdcage, and a tequila bar by Don Julio is hidden behind a hot-pink telephone booth.
Nine, the owner of this masthead, has a marquee for the first time, on so-called “Millionaires Row” in the front of the Birdcage with sweeping views of the track, while Schweppes and the Herald Sun are out of the exclusive enclosure this year.
The tallest marquees in the Birdcage are once again from Lexus and Crown, which have both built three-storey structures.
Interior designer Brahman Perera said he was asked to create a different experience on each level in the Lexus marquee.
Olympian Emma McKeon opens the G.H. Mumm marquee with a magnum of champagne. Credit: Eddie Jim
The first floor contains a restaurant headed by Atlas chef Charlie Carrington and a make-up and hair salon from Mecca, as well as the biggest Birdcage flex of all: private, plumbed-in toilets.
The second floor has a large outdoor deck and the top floor a lounge with Tarts Anon pastries. Paintings by Archibald finalist Zoe Young from Sophie Gannon Gallery are hung throughout the marquee and are for sale – for anyone who wins big on the day.
“The whole point was to make this space feel like it had some permanence and some integrity,” Perera said. “In that sense, to have real art by an Archibald finalist, that’s something that elevates it.”
Perera said Birdcage celebrations were being taken up a notch this year.
“It comes with the weather as well – people want to look towards the end of the year,” he said. “It’s a small moment, it’s only for a week, but hopefully, it sets the tone for things to come.”
At Crown, chef Guillaume Brahimi served up mini spanner crab sandwiches and blow-torched scallops topped with pea puree and caviar.
“My crab sandwich, a glass of champagne, the races – it’s a winning trifecta,” he said.
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