There’s joy in Hollywood tonight, the 138 acres behind the Hollywood sign will go into a public land trust. The hotly contested land on Cahuenga Peak is zoned for luxury homes and there was fear that it would be sold to developers if $12.5 million wasn’t raised to buy and protect the land. And here’s where good old Hugh steps in. Playboy magazine founder Hugh Hefner made a $900,000 donation at the last minute so that the conservation group “Trust for Public Land” could buy the land. California Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger said that Hefner was the final donor. Schwarzenegger was quoted in the LA Times praising the donation and result as “the Hollywood ending we hoped for.”

Hefner released a statement calling the Hollywood sign Hollywood’s Eiffel Tower and “an important cultural landmark.” Other donations came from Arianne Getty, Tiffany & Co. jewelers, Steven Spielberg and Tom Hanks. The sign itself is owned by Los Angeles but the land behind it belonged to investors who could have sold the rights to build four luxury mansions along the ridgeline for a tidy fortune (they were hoping for $22 million). The land will now be become part of the 4,200-acre Griffith Park sprawl. Recently the conservation group covered the Hollywood sign so that it instead read “Save the Peak.”

spotted @: luxist

Now even if you don’t have a first class seat, you can chill with the upper crust in this new boutique.

Pernod Ricard has opened the first Martell Experience Boutique in partnership with liquor and tobacco retailer Sky Connection at Hong Kong International airport (HKIA) terminal one’s arrivals area. The main attraction of the boutique is the Martell Discovery Table, where consumers see tasting notes for each Martell cognac and eaux-de-vie blend. Pernod made a commitment to the boutique at HKIA for three years, and is looking to roll it out to other airports.

Sky Connection CEO Baker Salleh said:

“What you see here today is actually the cooperation and culmination of a very successful and visionary investment in terms of duty free shops. As you can see across the way, there’s a very standard duty free shop where we try to cater to the maximum number of passengers, but on this side you see the epitome of a luxury boutique.”

Spotted @: luxist