The unusual venue was part of an attempt to give a younger, hipper feel to the annual event, which has been at the Seagram Building and the Downtown Association in recent years. "This year was really about, how can we make this colorful and fun?" said Architectural League executive assistant MaryBeth Morris, who coordinated the event.

This year's theme was CMYK—after the color printing process that uses only cyan, magenta, yellow and black—and event designer Roy Braeger filled the building's shell with four clear tents from Starr Tents decorated to match the four colors with lighting and food arrangements. Lux Lighting put yellow polka dots on the floor of the yellow tent and used black light to give a funky feel to the black tent, where DJ Liquid Todd played some disco and retro hits. At the other end of the party, two jazz bands, Mariani and Pectopah, played sets on a stage drenched in magenta light.

But the big hit of the night was a special interactive photo installation put together by photographer Mark Van S. and design firm Pentagram (who also did the event's color-saturated invites). Guests could step inside a booth to snap their own portraits using a digital camera, and then all of the photos got projected on a giant screen on one wall of the tent. Shot with incredibly flattering lighting against a white background, the Richard Avedon-style black-and-white portraits rotated throughout the night.

—Chad Kaydo