Themes

Turning an event's invitation and program into a comic book is a relatively easy way to add colorful visuals. Vintage cartoons inspired MacKenzie Brown's design for the Medical Research Institute Council of the Children's Memorial Hospital's Children's Ball in Chicago in 2010.

Appetizingly Yours served hors d'oeuvres on picture frames, so that guests could see descriptions of each dish. The baked new potatoes were made to look like deviled eggs, a popular dish in the 1960s.

Bartenders and servers wore blazers and bow ties to match the Mad Men theme.

Guests bid on items like Maple Leaf tickets in the silent auction.

Cigarette girls circulated with sushi, rolled to look like cigars.

Three kinds of cheesecake lollipops were brought out for dessert: white chocolate cheesecake covered in milk chocolate; pumpkin cheesecake covered in white chocolate and caramel; and chocolate cheesecake covered in dark chocolate and Skor.

Guests helped themselves to jumbo shrimp with horseradish cocktail sauce. Although the dish is from the 60s, Appetizingly Yours modernized the presentation with bamboo sticks and shot glasses.

In addition to the cigar-shaped sushi, the cigarette girls circulated with Swedish meatballs.

Guests served themselves at the cheese fondue station.

The cocktail party was held in the marble lobby of Imperial Plaza, commissioned in the 1950s by the Rockefeller family. The space is being refurnished as a condominium.

William MacTaggart, investment adviser at Macquarie Private Wealth, thanked guests.