Memorial Day marks the unofficial start of summer—or what 7-Eleven refers to as "Slurpee Season." To officially ring in the carefree days ahead, the retailer hosted an event on May 22 with actress Ashley Benson at its Hollywood location. Benson took an inaugural sip of a Slurpee Lite, then sat her cup down on a colorful contraption that recalled a Rube Goldberg machine. The weight of the cup prompted a chain reaction that ended in a banner unfurling; the banner read "Slurpee Season is Now Open!"
The 25th incarnation of I.C.F.F. ran May 18 to 21 at the Jacob K. Javits Convention Center in New York. A great place for event professionals to get ideas and inspiration, the show displayed items such as Toyko-based Oodesign's tiny floating vases. The vessels hold individual buds and submerge their stems in water.
Chicago restaurant Allium served a swimsuit-friendly 500-calorie lunch at a recent beachwear fashion show at the Four Seasons Chicago. The three-course menu included beet salad with Greek yogurt, fennel, and mache lettuce; wild Alaskan halibut with smoked fingerlings, pickled ramp bulbs, asparagus, and English peas (pictured); and 99 percent pure chocolate sorbet.
For an upscale camp-themed affair, KG Fare Catering & Events offers a mess-free take on s'mores, displayed on clothespins.
At the Pratt Institute Fashion Show and Cocktail Benefit on April 25, models walked a ribbon-shaped runway. Held at Center548 in New York, the show displayed edgy looks from 17 student designers, and Blumlein Associates Inc. designed the fittingly forward-thinking runway and set. With a design team led by Claudia Castro—herself a Pratt alum—the runway was designed so that the collection could be viewed from any angle in the room.
The Museum of Modern Art’s annual Party in the Garden took place on May 21. Overhead, dense arrangements of tropical plants were suspended between white pillars, creating a jungle-like canopy effect.
Billed as the most successful cancer-related fund-raising gala in Canada, the Daffodil Ball on April 18 had a Great Gatsby theme that brought the 1920s to life at Windsor Station in Montreal. In the cocktail space, a living fountain twirled around slowly.
Donatella Versace debuted her newest Versus Versace collection with a bash for 1,300 guests at New York's 69th Regiment Armory on May 15. Complementing three mini fashion shows and concerts, a pedicab sporting a rotating carousel of rainbow-colored Venus Versace bags made its way throughout the cavernous venue, offering guests the chance to hop on the back for a ride.
Sheraton Social Hour is a premium wine service developed in conjunction with Wine Spectator magazine. To launch the new program at the Sheraton New York Times Square Hotel, a penthouse event on May 15 served vino from a custom bar constructed out of wine bottles. Designed by Level Productions and built by Abunch LLC, the bar was flanked by signage that explained the taste profile of the wines, along with snacks that paired with them.
Need some pool party inspiration? Chandon kicked off the season in quirky style at its American Summer Soiree on May 21 and made creative use out of an inexpensive prop: pool toys. Celebrity guests such as Brittany Snow posed in front of a step-and-repeat that comprised bright blue dolphins, smiling pink flamingos, branded beach balls, and other inflatable toys.
For an October 2012 wedding at the New York Public Library, Xochitl Gonzalez of AAB Productions designed a chuppah made of books. "We were inspired by the location, of course, but also by a display of books that the groom liked in a bookstore—and, of course, the lightbulb room at the Gramercy Park Hotel," Gonzalez said. "We used books to create the wedding canopy and created spirals as well as a 'shelf' at the top. We wanted a grand library feel, so we used the red drapes as a backdrop, and we opened them up after the cocktail hour. The canopy served as a bar backdrop."
In 2011, Target made perhaps the biggest statement possible using books—a 26-foot-tall sculpture made from 25,000 books. The installation, part of a kickoff event in New York for the retailer's Read Across America campaign, used Dr. Seuss books, which were later donated to local schools.
This year's Romance Novel Convention was held at the Golden Nugget in Las Vegas August 7 to 11. For an appropriately lavish—and bookish—prop, Romantic Victorian Home Collection designed a dress using the covers and pages of damaged books that had been marked for disposal by the local library.
An outward-facing shelf filled with books served as an appropriate, on-theme lectern for the Children's Book Choice Awards event in New York in May.
At the 2012 design showcase, David Stark's whimsical installation for sponsor Benjamin Moore played off the slogan “A whole new chapter in paint color technology is being written.” The library-inspired setting featured a table made from actual books with handcrafted pop-up books serving as a centerpiece.
At the Toronto gala in 2012, stacks of books supported and decorated the dessert tables. Desserts were served on open books, and chocolate petit fours were topped with a decorative page of writing. Typewriters, globes, and open books added to the presentation.
Bulgari's 2011 fund-raiser for Save the Children and Artists For Peace and Justice used real books—and graphic versions—to create a lavish library look at Ron Burkle's private Los Angeles manse. Sketched fabrics on the tent walls imitated library shelves, while children's books redone with white book jackets served as centerpieces for the tables.
At this year's Sundance Film Festival, the Mint Agency and its sister agency the Branding Bee hosted a series of premiere parties in a pop-up at 614 Main Street in Park City, Utah. As a subtle way to incorporate branding and signage from sponsors into the speakeasy-style decor, the production team used three bookshelves as step-and-repeats.
It may have had nothing to do with books or libraries per se, but Acer's 2010 press conference used floor-to-ceiling projections of books to create a cozy area within the white-walled event venue.
Blowups of pages from the American Cancer Society's history book hung throughout the Radisson Blu Aqua Hotel at the springtime gala in Chicago. The pages contained significant facts about the society. HMR Designs handled decor.
In 2010, the lavish launch party for the world’s first dedicated Hermès men’s store turned a raw 20,000-square-foot New York space into the ultimate leisure spot for men. This included a 3,000-square-foot library where the focal point was a wall of 8,000 hand-dyed books.
In 2011, In Style's Golden Globes party with Warner Brothers at the Beverly Hilton had a chic library look designed by Thomas Ford. Ford was inspired by a luxury penthouse and constructed a tent over the hotel pool to transform the space, creating the feel of a dark library with custom black leather tufted couches and 3,000 wrapped books on elaborate bookshelves.
At the Chicago theater's 2012 gala, the theme was "the written word." In Event Creative's decor, pages from a script hung from round chandeliers on the ceiling.
Rhona Frazin, president and C.E.O. of the Chicago Public Library Foundation, said the planning team aimed to "bring the library into the space that we were in" for the benefit at the Forum at the University of Illinois Chicago in 2010. At the end of the evening, guests could take home the Toni Morrison books that topped each table. (Morrison was the evening's guest of honor.) More thematic touches included traditional library lamps on each table.
Blowups of book covers and playbills from works by previous honorees served as decor at the Library Foundation of Los Angeles's gala in 2009.
After a long Oscar night, host Seth MacFarlane's official after-party included a station from Tkees, which encouraged guests to check their heels (similar to the way they would at a coat check) and pick up a pair of flip-flops—in gold, appropriate to the occasion.
Guests arriving at USA Network's event atop the High Line in New York last summer found a receiving line of umbrella-wielding staffers, who provided shelter all the way to the entrance of the covered bash.
At Lacoste's Coachella pool party in the blazing desert sun, cigarette-style girls, clad in Lacoste gear, passed Kiel's sun-protection products.
When the weather unexpectedly turned sour at South by Southwest this year, ponchos from Warner Brothers served as protection from the rain as well as an opportunity to promote CW television series Arrow.
Bonnaroo attendees could relax in hammocks and enter to win V.I.P. passes in the "Great State Lounge" hosted by State Farm. The insurance company also provided what it called "Bonnaroo Roadside Assistance"—free services such as help with flat tires and dead batteries.
At the WWD Beauty C.E.O. Summit in Palm Beach, yoga on branded mats on the lawn allowed guests to relax and unwind.
More than 80,000 people traveled to a remote 700-acre farm in Tennessee June 7 to 10 for the Bonnaroo Music & Arts Festival. Knowing the attendees would be outside day and night listening music on multiple stages, brands such as Garnier Fructis provided practical services such as free hair-washing and styling in a 40- by 40-foot air-conditioned tent.
Things tend to get messy at food festivals, tastings, and other events with lots of grub, so Delta provided toothpicks, hand wipes, and mints at the 2010 New York City Wine & Food Festival, a smart way to get the brand in front of attendees.
During Upfront Week in New York last year, Turner Broadcasting held back-to-back late-night events and, to help transport guests from the Adult Swim party to the shindig for TruTV, provided a fleet of pedicabs offering free rides.
For a recent press event in Los Angeles, Paul Frank brought Starring Fragrances for a station that gave guests the chance to take home custom fragrances, made on the spot according to their individual tastes.
At the FN C.E.O. Summit in Miami, guests could charge their smartphones in a luxe lounge—a stylish, discreet solution to manage the task that everyone wants as a convenience at events. The centerpieces during the education sessions were framed instructions on how to reference the summit on social media and log on to the hotel's Wi-Fi network.
MSNBC also had a flip-flop station at its White House Correspondents' Association Dinner after-party, providing relief for folks who had been on their feet all evening.
The 13th annual Storybook Ball was held October 20 at the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston. The Sound of Music-themed decor included centerpieces of wildflowers accented with tiny guitars, designed by Winston Flowers.
The Chicago Botanic Garden’s fall fund-raiser, the Harvest Ball, took place on garden grounds September 22. To underscore the autumnal theme, Botanicals' arrangements of roses also held golden gourds and pumpkins.
Held in October, the 10th annual After School Matters gala took place in the grand ballroom of Chicago’s Navy Pier. Colorful mosaic-decorated flower pots—created by teens in the Mosaic Collaborative program—adorned the dinner tables.
