For the cocktail hour, a string quartet from Duchin Entertainment serenaded guests while they enjoyed drinks and watched flat-screen monitors play "video posters" (a series of photo stills) produced by Titlewave Productions showing AmeriCares' disaster relief work abroad. The gorgeous interior of the Regent's ballroom, with its soaring ceiling and grand pillars, didn't call for any flashy decor. DeJuan Stroud provided simple centerpieces of red tulips to adorn the dinner tables, and larger arrangements of cherry blossoms, spirea, viburnum and hydrangea to stand near the front door.

--Suzanne Ito