Meeting attendees can give back with Alexandria Cares’s new corporate community service program. Washington's Alexandria Convention & Visitors Association pairs groups with nonprofits for teambuilding activities.
Photo: Alexandria Convention & Visitors Association
Orlando's Impact Entertainment Services is now offering 3-D chalk art. Artist Jennifer Chaparro can create designs based on a theme or draw corporate logos on surfaces such as canvas and cement.
Photo: Courtesy of Jennifer Chaparro
The new Ascott dining table from Orlando-based Chic Event Furniture Rentals has a wireless LED top that can be programmed to glow in a variety of colors. The table rents for $225 per day.
Photo: Birch Mangus
As an interactive alternative to a stationary raw bar, roaming servers from Oysters XO shuck oysters on the spot, equipped with buckets of oysters on ice hanging from their waists. The company currently offers its services in the New York area and has plans to expand to Los Angeles, San Francisco, Miami, and Mexico City in 2013.
Photo: Roberta Marroquin Doria
At the American Museum of Natural History through August is “Our Global Kitchen: Food, Nature, Culture.” The exhibit explores the history of food from an educational and cultural perspective. Guests can taste seasonal treats, cook a virtual meal via video projections, and view rare artifacts. In conjunction, the New York City museum is hosting an 18-foot-tall hydroponic vertical garden installation designed by Windowfarms.
Photo: Roderick Mickens/American Museum of Natural History
The lobby bar, Living Room, at the W South Beach Hotel & Residences in Miami, has introduced a new cocktail program by drink designer Scott Beattie. The tipples are made with seasonal herbs, essential oils, edible flowers, and local organic produce.
Photo: Liza Gershman
Los Angeles's new Roger Room Cocktail Catering and Bar Service brings glassware and mixologists to events to deliver cocktails like the Tijuana Brass, a mix of Tres Reyes Blanco tequila, lime juice, agave syrup, and cucumber foam.
Photo: Elizabeth Daniels Photography
DNA Events in Los Angeles has introduced its Boozy Ice Cream Bar for events. The service involves female staffers dressed as retro cigarette girls serving trays of alcoholic milkshakes, like the Drunken Girl Scout Cookie, a mix of rum, vanilla ice cream, fresh mint, crème de menthe, and chocolate chips.
Photo: Tommy B Photography
The Westin Lake Las Vegas Resort & Spa, located about 20 minutes from the Strip, is now offering “board meetings”—stand-up paddleboarding on the property’s lake. Activities can include relay races, jousting atop the paddleboards, or scavenger hunts on land and water.
Photo: Courtesy of The Westin Lake Las Vegas Resort & Spa
For a corporate gift that’s more stylish than your standard box of chocolates, call Giorgio Armani’s Armani/Dolci. The line includes Italian-made pralines, chocolate bars, spreadable creams, cakes, tea, pâtes de fruits, and more, wrapped in sleek brown-and-gold packaging. Gift boxes start from $35 and can be shipped worldwide.
Photo: Courtesy of Armani/Dolci
Dallas-based Suite 206's new Savile Row collection includes masculine-looking furniture rentals such as the nail head-accented Tomas wingback chair. Individual pieces are priced from $55 to $350 and are available nationwide.
Photo: Roderick Peña
The Savoy Flea in Chicago is a new vintage shop that also offers event styling and props. The shop’s rental inventory includes candelabras, vintage suitcases, an ivory satin sofa, and more. The owners can also create custom decor pieces such as garlands and backdrops.
Photo: Courtesy of The Savoy Flea
Chicago's Chuck’s Manufacturing takes a clever old-school approach to marketing: At the end of a meal, diners get a branded postcard. Guests can leave filled-out postcards at the table or drop them off at the hostess’s stand to be mailed out.
Photo: Jeff Schear
Popcorn boutique Corn & Company has opened in Burlington and offers the snack in more than 250 unusual flavors, including dill pickle, wasabi, and birthday cake. It can be doled out as favors or at popcorn bars for events. The Boston-based shop can also host private affairs.
Photo: Courtesy of Corn & Company
LM Cocktail Catering in Austin can create high-end Jell-O shots. Flavors like blackberry bramble and Pimm’s cup are served in elegant hors d’oeuvre spoons and paired with fresh fruit.
Photo: Courtesy of LM Cocktail Catering
Chile sponsored the reception and served salmon ceviche from an ice sculpture in the center of the reception area.
Photo: D. Channing Muller for BizBash
The Washington National Opera Ball took over the ceremonial building at the Embassy of the Russian Federation in 2010. Event producer Sandi Hoffman of Sandi R. Hoffman Special Events transformed the lobby into a winter landscape with plush white carpets and white birch trees lining the hallway.
Photo: Tony Brown/imijphoto.com for BizBash
For a winter-themed corporate party, design director Andrew Zill of Baltimore-based Feats Inc. created a snowy scene that included a glowing bar anchored by a crystal-flocked tree.
Photo: Edwin Remsberg
In New York, the Sanctuary Hotel's Haven Rooftop has been turned into a ski chalet for the winter season. Available for private events, the fully tented, heated space comes complete with new seasonal drinks, such as peppermint hot cocoa spiked with Bailey's, and a menu of hearty, savory dishes. Revelers also have the option to take a "ski shot"—four signature shots to share with friends—off of an actual ski.
Photo: Steve Zak
Kapture Vision produced a holiday bash with a masquerade theme for CyberCoders in December at Newport Beach Dunes Resort in Newport Beach, California. Jay's Catering set up a s'more station where guests could fire-roast their own desserts.
Photo: Callie Biggerstaff
Canteen Vending Services' Branding Event
To introduce brand changes to employees, clients, and partners last August, Canteen turned Fulton's on the River in Chicago into a celebratory setting that would have made Don Draper feel right at home. Kehoe Designs handled decor, creating mod lounge areas in the company's signature colors of gray, lime, and emerald green. Each table held prop ashtrays and popcorn and truffle chips in mini fryer baskets.
Photo: Rick Aguilar
Carlson Wagonlit Travel "Thrive in Retro" Event
Snacks also matched the retro theme at Carlson Wagonlit Travel's after-party. Served in spoons, on square plates, and in decorative bowls, menu items included deviled eggs, Caesar-salad spring rolls, and B.L.T.-stuffed tomatoes.
Photo: Courtesy of Kuoni Destination Management
Canteen Vending Services's Branding Event
Passed snacks at the Canteen event included mini burgers with truffle aioli, cheddar, and onion straws. The retro-style bites were garnished with sandwich picks and cornichons.
Photo: Rick Aguilar
Macquarie Private Wealth Cocktails for a Cause Fund-Raiser
Macquarie Private Wealth hosted a Mad Men-inspired cocktail party in Toronto in the fall of 2011. Kim Graham and Associates produced the event and incorporated the 1960s into every aspect, including the menu. 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.
Photo: Josh Fee for BizBash
AMC's 'Mad Men' Third Season Premiere
At AMC's public screening of the show's third-season premiere in Times Square in 2009, staffers dressed as cigarette girls passed out popcorn to costumed fans.
Photo: Stuart Ramson
"Love is in the Air" Event at the New York Botanical Garden
Live musical acts are borrowing inspiration from the evocative era of the 1920s. Costumed entertainers from Elan Artists took the stage at a collaboration between the New York Botanical Garden and Stephen Starr Events on March 20.
Photo: Lina Jang Photographers
'Food & Wine' Best New Chefs Event
At the 575-guest gathering at New York's Pranna on April 2, chef Grant Achatz served up a culinary spectacle. He placed pieces of Wagyu short ribs on cinammon sticks, then lit the sticks on fire for a fragrant touch.
Photo: Nadia Chaudhury/BizBash
Discovery Upfront
ID—which airs shows such as Dates From Hell, Deadly Affairs, and Frenemies—had a "guilty pleasures bar" at the Discovery Upfront in New York April 4. The bright station offered a decadent array of candy and cake pops, as well as giveaways of nail polish and T-shirts printed with the labels "Diva," "Vixen," and "Ladykiller."
Photo: ImageLinkPhoto.com
The Patricia and Phillip Frost Museum of Science’s Galaxy Gala
The Patricia and Phillip Frost Museum of Science’s annual Galaxy Gala March 9 had an aquatic theme inspired by the museum’s new facility now under construction, which includes a 500,000-gallon aquarium. Produced by Jose Dans and held at the JW Marriott Marquis, the event featured various centerpiece designs by Wow Factor that included stacked fishbowls filled with sand, lichen, pincushion proteas, and red branches.
Photo: Photo: Meg Pukel
