The distinctive red Paladar Fumior Salon on the corner of Fish Lane and Merivale Street has been reopened as Miss Green’s Beans by 20-year old barista and student Sinead Green.
Having recently returned to Brisbane after a short stint in Melbourne completing a Visual Arts Diploma at RMIT, Sinead, now studying psychology, has joined forces with mother Brigitte O’Brien to spruce up the Paladar and offer coffee to locals.
Sinead said working out of the popular Paladar building was a wonderful welcome back to Queensland. “Every day I have new faces coming in, plus a few regulars now, and I just enjoy being part of South Brisbane and West End,” she said.
Brigitte now runs her talent agency, MAX Talent Management, from behind the coffee machine. Brigitte has been in the modelling industry since she was a teenager and recently discovered a love for acting, appearing in short films, feature films, corporate videos, music videos and as an extra in the Warner Bros. film San Andreas that was shot in south east Queensland.
While Brigitte is the first to tell aspiring actors and models that success comes from hard work, she acknowledges that some of Hollywood’s biggest stars got their break after being “discovered” in a cafes, restaurants and bars. “Academy Award-winner Natalie Portman started modelling after she was discovered by a Revlon representative in a pizza parlor in New York. She was just 11,” Brigitte said. “And another Academy Award-winner, Matthew McConaughey, got his career break in a hotel bar in Austin, Texas when he met a producer/casting director which led to his first movie role.
“While I’m realistic about finding ‘the next big thing’ when they order a macchiato from Sinead at the counter, we did deliberately partner the coffee shop and the talent agency so we had somewhere different for my clients to come.”
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