Eventastic

Guests, including Rachael Ray, Bobby Flay, and Emeril Lagasse, entered the event by walking down a long hallway dubbed the “Hall of Masters,” which was lined with 36 blown-up portraits of the network’s biggest stars.

Once inside the party space, guests were met by a towering birthday “cake” composed of more than 40 whitewashed vintage TVs playing old Food Network clips. Two days later, the design was repurposed for the New York City Wine & Food Festival’s Tacos & Tequila bash, with the televisions playing clips from event sponsor NY1.

To create the atmosphere of an art museum, producers designed the lounge areas that ran down the center of the room in an all-white palette, helping the surrounding vignettes pop. Glass display cases held memorabilia and props from Food Network and Cooking Channel shows.

Stone Dog Studios constructed a 10- by 10-foot wall displaying the Food Network logo in its Brooklyn studio. Once it was delivered to Pier 92, the wall was planted with fresh basil and rosemary and installed behind one of the bars, allowing bartenders to add fresh herbs to the evening’s signature cocktails.

One food station played off the idea that when viewers watch the Food Network, they wish the food could be served directly through their TV sets. Embedded with working televisions playing cooking show clips from the network’s early years, an automat-style wall had chefs handing small plates to guests through a row of televisions with the screens removed.

Local artist Clare Herron recreated the Cooking Channel’s logo using kitchen items such as salt shakers, spatulas, and plastic straws.

Staffers offered guests caviar and oysters from an ice bar that had brightly colored plastic sea creatures frozen inside.

To represent the Food Network magazine, artist Clare Herron spent the event inside an 8- by 8-foot Plexiglas cube with stacks of back issues and a pair of scissors. Throughout the evening, she created a collage by taping magazine cutouts to the walls. “By the end of the night, it was one big art piece,” Blatter said.

Dynamic Productions designed a diner-style food station as a nod to the popularity of shows like Guy Fieri’s Diners, Drive-Ins, and Dives that highlight America’s regional cuisine. The station served Maine lobster rolls, Bronx meatball parms, Texas barbecue pork sliders, and Carolina corn spoon bread.

Stone Dog Studios crafted dozens of fake macarons from Styrofoam and rigged them to create a 10-foot-tall chandelier that hung over a dessert station serving real macarons in flavors including birthday cake, pumpkin, and pistachio.

Rory Mulholland Scenery created custom marquee signs for each of the Food Network’s current shows.

Ronen Rental’s chalkboard bar features chalkboard panels set in an aluminum frame. The bar comes in two sizes: six feet long and four feet long. Available to rent in South Florida, chalk is included. The company can also make custom stencils for easy personalization.

Pressed Cotton sells gray-washed wooden chalkboard boxes, from $19 each, that can be filled with plants or flowers and used as centerpieces. Have the boxes do double duty by using chalk to write table numbers on the side.

Also available through Pressed Cotton are chalkboard tags, $3.50 each, which can be used as signage or place cards or can be hung from the neck of wine bottles to designate tables.

To promote its first book, blog Design Sponge toured the West Coast in 2011. At a book signing in Los Angeles, guests could pose in front of—and draw on—a chalkboard backdrop created by event and styling production company Bash Please.

For a corporate event held in one of the hotel kitchens at the Atlanta Hyatt, Steve Bales of Bold American Events & Catering built floor-to-ceiling chalkboard walls on which he personalized each guest’s apron by scrawling his or her name next to it.

To build buzz for its latest product collaboration with charity organization Feed Projects, Target threw a rustic-Americana-theme dinner party underneath the Brooklyn Bridge in June. Freestanding chalkboard signs set up outside the open-air venue in Brooklyn Bridge Park helped guests find their way.

Also at the Target event, chalkboard menus placed near the bar areas displayed the cocktail hour offerings.

At the National Stationery Show in May, black-and-white stripes accented a stationery suite printed on a chalkboard-style background from Something Detailed.

Earlier this year at TEDActive, the official TED conference simulcast held in Palm Springs, TEDx planners from around the world expressed themselves on an interactive chalkboard wall.

The Southern-hospitality-infused welcome bash at the Engage! luxury-wedding business summit, held in June at the Biltmore Estate in Asheville, North Carolina, featured a chalkboard map that outlined the various locations of the four-part event.

Available to rent throughout California, Arizona, and Las Vegas, Lounge Appeal’s Beachwood Chalkboard table allows guests to doodle on the surface. The 2- by 4-foot table comes in 42-, 30-, and 18-inch-tall versions.

In 2006 at the Robin Hood Foundation benefit, designer David Stark created towering hand-drawn sketches depicting New York scenes across more than 35,000 square feet of chalkboard. Guests could add to the work with bowls of chalk placed on the highboy tables throughout the cocktail area.