Emeril Lagasse, deluged with requests from charities, meant it when he said no one would have to twist his arm to get him to return to the three-day Naples Winter Wine Festival. The night before the 2007 auction, which will be held Jan. 27 at the Ritz-Carlton Golf Resort, he'll again be manning the burners at the Port Royal home of Grace and Ken Evenstad. All celebrities say it's about the kids, but few spend as much time talking-and listening-to them as Lagasse did on his visit last January.

Serious food and wine types are salivating over the first-time appearances of influential wine critic Robert Parker and super-chef Wolfgang Puck. Mr. Spago will be plating his nouvelle California cuisine at the home of festival chairs Linda and Jim Malone, where Ann Colgin will pour her coveted cabernets. The pretty, multitasking Colgin is once again emceeing the auction with Londoner Humphrey Butler, and her much-lusted-after auction lot includes a walk-on part on Grey's Anatomy. Hmmm-which to bid on, the custom Rolls-Royce Phantom or the chance to ogle Patrick Dempsey without risking a restraining order?

Another top lot is a trip on Martha Stewart's private plane and dinner with her at her Maine home. Linda Malone, who lured the domestic doyenne to the festival, isn't yet sure whether Stewart will make a personal appearance to hype her auction lot. Do expect to see the featured artist, sculptor Don Gummer, whose critical reputation in highbrow circles rivals that of his wife, Meryl Streep.

It's been a happy year for the trustees of the Naples Children and Education Foundation, the grant-giving arm of the festival, who raised $13.7 million at the 2006 event, breaking their own previous world record for a charity wine event. Last June, trustees Valerie and Jeff Gargiulo celebrated the Napa Valley wedding of their daughter, April. Part-time Neapolitans Elizabeth and Clarke Swanson have announced the engagement of their daughter, Alexis, to Trevor Traina, stepson of Danielle Steel. What if Stewart, Streep and Steel were all to show up at this year's festivities? Holy media triumvirate, Batman, we'll drink to that.

What do you give the

woman who has everything? How about some serious star power? On March 31, Bernadette Peters and Kathleen Battle are slated to perform at a $1,000-a-ticket fundraising gala to congratulate the Philharmonic Center for the Arts and its founder, Myra Janco Daniels, on the organization's 25th anniversary. In April, Kim Long and her Fun Time Early Childhood Academy board mark the institution's 45th birthday with

a salute to 45 local legends, including 96-year-old midwife "Mother" Annie Mae Perry and longtime community activists Herb and Alma Cambridge. Keep up the good works!

Nature's transformations,

the theme of the Naples Winter Wine Festival, is distilled neatly into the event's tagline: "Transforming children's lives." But Jane Lane, co-chair of Art Royale, the interactive Fort Myers benefit for Alliance for the Arts, says that event's theme, Metamorphosis, instantly brought conflicting interpretations from the artists to whom it was proposed. And that's what makes the Nov. 18 arts happening so interesting. In the spirit established by the event's founder, Aida Bukovica, Art Royale will focus on the wealth of talent among local artists and performers. Rock out in the Hoodoo Lounge, organized by artist Pat Collins and featuring such musicians as Collins' husband, Bill Courtwright, and power-pop impresario Richard Castelli. Don't forget to check out the sometimes-outrageous themed get-ups. (We're counting on someone inspired by Franz Kafka's Metamorphosis to show up as a palmetto bug.) The one-night-only art and music installations on the Alliance campus will be complemented by a permanent sculpture by metal artist James DiGeorgio.

Other transformations

of note: Cole Peacock, Sharon Torregrossa and other chic Chico's powerbrokers turn Lee's Healthy Start into a major nonprofit player with a big-ticket, Cirque-themed bash on Oct. 21. ... Jerry and Diane Thirion recreate Monte Carlo on Naples Bay for the David Lawrence Center Foundation's new themed event on Jan. 15. ... For a '70s-themed Lee County Heart Ball on May 12, chair Sandy Stilwell will transform an ordinary hotel ballroom into Studio 54. Gentleman, we don't think you can pass that blue leisure suit off as black tie, but we trust that the ladies can put their hands on some vintage von Furstenberg.

With gala auctions offer-

ing increasingly exotic travel packages, staying home can be the biggest adventure of all. For the Oct. 28 NCH Hospital Ball, chaired by Rainey Norins and Renée Relf, landscape architect Gail Boorman will honor the ball's Secret Garden theme by customizing a meditation garden, complete with flowering bowers and a bubbling fountain, for one bidder. Nostalgia-and the chance to hide away and read your favorite childhood novels-included at no extra charge.

At Seacrest's Gala for Treasures, a series of Desperate Housewives-themed parties have been so popular that the guys (Desperate housemen? Harried husbands?) have clamored to be let in on the action. At the school's gala on April 21, parents Nancy and Bryant Yunker Jr. will answer the call by donating a gathering designed to appeal to both sexes. Rumor says the soiree will be held at Yunker's much-anticipated Bayshore-area nightclub, Sway, ready to open this season after a couple of years of naming, permitting and investor hassles.

Couture celebrity michael

Vollbracht, top designer for Bill Blass, will show off his flirty fashions at Saks' runway benefit for Saint Ann School on Feb. 28, with Christine Flynn and Sandra Gerry chairing. Gerry is no stranger to celebrity-when it was under construction, her rambling Gordon Drive estate attracted so many gawkers that Tom Cruise could have driven past unnoticed. A big supporter of Saint Ann, Gerry doesn't have children or grandchildren at Naples' oldest private school-just a heart as big as her home, friends say.

Ashleigh Banfield, the featured speaker at this year's luncheon for the Shelter for Abused Women, is best known for her tough post-9/11 reporting for MSNBC. But the Court TV talk-show hostess knows the shelter's board president, Naples' Suzie Lount, as Mom. Back in the broadcast game after taking some time off, Banfield relaxed this summer at the family's Canada lake house with her new son, Jay Fischer Gould. (Banfield's husband, Howard, is the great-great-grandson of 19th-century robber baron Jay Gould.)

Serious speakers aren't a hard sell for Planned Parenthood, which treats supporters to an appearance by Jane Fonda on Feb. 23, or the Holocaust Museum of Southwest Florida, which welcomes Judea Pearl, father of murdered journalist Daniel Pearl, to a patrons' party and documentary screening on March 4.