Dianna

The Sheraton San Diego Hotel & Marina has partnered with San Diego Bay Adventures for a nighttime water activity. Dubbed “Nite Opps,” the experience lets guests take guided tours through the San Diego Bay while standing on LED-lit paddleboards. Afterwards, guests gather around a fire for refreshments and Hawaiian-style storytelling. A typical group for the activity is 10 to 20 guests, but the program is available for larger numbers of attendees.

Hotel Madeline Telluride in Colorado offers a GPS Orienteering Quest that can be catered to any group size. Guests explore the mining town in a team-based mission to find hidden flags. Teams use two-way radios, GPS units, maps, verbal instructions, and a set of clues during the expedition.

In Manhattan, Halcyon Sailing offers interactive sailing events for groups of 24. Participants get a sailing course at the company’s TriBeCa loft; then head to the New York Harbor to race 30-foot boats past iconic landmarks such as the Statue of Liberty. After about two hours, the group returns to shore for a champagne toast. The entire outing lasts three and a half to eight hours.

In New Mexico, Adventure Partners has teamed up with Four Seasons Rancho Encantado to offer a summit climb for corporate groups of 15. The activity begins with a scenic drive to Windsor Trail. Guests then hike through alpine forests and wildflower meadows to reach one of several summits; each offers impressive views.

Art restaurant at the Four Seasons Hotel Seattle has a new activity called Market to Art. Staffers take a group of 10 to the outdoor Pike Place Market, where guests are split into teams of two. Each team gets $60 and 30 minutes to select ingredients for one of five courses for the evening’s meal. The chefs at the hotel’s restaurant then make a dish using the gathered ingredients, and each team presents “its” plate to the group.

The Royal Hawaiian on Waikiki Beach in Oahu has a new canoe-based activity for groups. Inspired by the ancient Hawaiian tradition of outrigger canoe paddling, the experience puts guests in canoes (or wa’as) that seat six paddlers apiece. Teammates use synchronized movements to make the canoe glide through the water quickly and smoothly, and each team member has a different role. The activity is available for groups of 50 or more.

Owners of the chic Bistrot Bagatelle have expanded their empire with Villa Bagatelle, a boutique hotel in South Beach that opened in June. Designed by Callin Fortis of Big Time Design Studios in a French Mediterranean style, the property has 31 guest rooms, a rooftop pool, and other amenities. For events, groups can book the Presidential Suite, which spans nearly 2,800 square feet including a balcony. It holds 50 people for receptions or banquets or seats 24 guests conference-style. The Bagatelle Garden, a landscaped courtyard, holds 150 for receptions or seats for 75 banquet-style. The 7,000-square-foot rooftop terrace holds 225 guests for receptions.

Hyde Beach Kitchen and Cocktails, a massive new oceanside entertainment venue in Hallandale Beach, is scheduled to open at the end of August. The 10,000-square-foot space from SBE spans three floors. The first floor has casual dining and a spa; the second floor features a patio restaurant serving contemporary American cuisine from chef Danny Elmaleh; and the third floor has a pool and lounge, cabanas, and meeting space. The venue also has multiple full bars, a sound system, and a DJ input. The space holds 300 guests for receptions.

Part of the National Register of Historic Places, Miami Beach Women’s Club opened as an event space in the Collins Park neighborhood in May. The Mediterranean Revival style venue, operated by the South Beach Hotel Group, offers 3,500 square feet indoors and 1,500 square feet outdoors and seats 80 guests banquet-style with a dance floor or 100 theater-style. Amenities include a large stage in the main room as well as in-house audiovisual equipment, rentals, a full catering kitchen, and valet.

From famed Colombian chef Juan Manuel Barrientos comes Elcielo, his first restaurant in the United States following locations in Medellin and Bogota. The telegenic Barrientos—he hosts The Taste Colombia—interprets Colombian cuisine through modern techniques intended to stimulate the senses. Dishes include “Crabrûlée,” a savory take on the dessert, and a panna cotta shaped into a hard-boiled egg with a liquid passion fruit “yolk.” The sleek-looking eatery seats 60 inside and has a private dining room for 30 guests. Outside, the upper terrace seats 130, while a covered outdoor space seats 90. The lower terrace is available for receptions or as a display area large enough to showcase cars. The restaurant, located along the Miami River in Brickell, offers deep-water dockage and valet for as many as 60 cars. It opened in January.

Hyatt Centric South Beach Miami opened at 16th Street and Collins Avenue in June. The 105-room hotel, a new lifestyle brand from Hyatt, has a third-floor pool deck with cabanas, a Spanish-Mediterranean restaurant called Deck Sixteen, and a 600-square-foot meeting room. The 10-story glass tower, designed by architect Kobi Karp, blends the area’s Art Deco history into a modern look.

Primrose South Beach, the new restaurant at the Stiles Hotel, serves a mix of French, Asian, and American cuisine. The space offers a main dining room, alfresco seating on Collins Avenue, and outdoor dining overlooking the hotel’s pool. The dining room mixes rustic touches such as a wall covered in wide-plank wood with chic copper-colored banquettes. It seats about 60 guests.

As part of an ongoing, multimillion-dollar renovation, Hawks Cay Resort in the Florida Keys has renovated its meeting space. Following a gut renovation of three smaller meeting rooms, the resort created the Dolphin Ballroom. It features new carpet, wall coverings, audiovisual from PSAV, natural light, and water views. The space seats 400 at rounds or 600 theater-style. Other changes at the 60-acre property include converting its Ocean restaurant into a dedicated space for events, and a new 250-seat restaurant, Angler & Ale, that is slated to open in January.

Following turns as a nightclub and photography studio, the Paris Theater in South Beach reopened as an event space June 1. The luxe venue features opulent chandeliers, gilded mirrors, and extensive draping. It seats 200 on the lower level and has an upper level that seats 80 or can be used as a lounge area. Overall the theater holds 1,100 for receptions. The venue retained its stage and offers basic sound, light, and LED capabilities for events.

A former warehouse in Wynwood was converted into Social Hall, a bar and event space from Concrete Beach Brewery that debuted in late May. The venue is attached to the two-story craft brewery and serves its beers in the hall. Guests can view the brewery tanks through large glass windows. The space features a circular indoor-outdoor bar as well as communal tables and holds nearly 150 people for receptions.

A nondescript access shaft leads to Libertine, a new bar downtown with a comprehensive mixology program. The space, designed by Thrilwall Design, is intended to evoke a sense of glamorous decay and features a DJ booth fashioned from a repurposed baby grand piano. The floor is covered in thousands of pennies that are arranged by finish to create a  pattern. The bar, which opened in June, is available for buyout and holds 150 people.

Super 8 Hotels celebrated the major remodeling of its guest rooms this month by hosting a free art auction on Thursday to give away paintings from the hotel brand's old guest rooms. Hosted by Amy Sedaris, the event took over New York's 168 Bowery and featured a branded painting display that showed off the types of paintings media and the public were able to take home.

As part of White House Correspondents' Association Dinner festivities, Time and People hosted a party on April 29 at the St. Regis hotel. The event featured an adult lemonade stand that served political-theme cocktails, which included the tequila-based "Primary Punch" and the vodka-based "Delegate."

German luxury brand Montblanc celebrated its 110th anniversary with a black-tie gala on April 5 at the Rainbow Room in New York. At the event, guests could deliver high-tech messages to the brand via a digital screen, which then displayed the messages on a dedicated video wall. The wall was framed in red and surrounded by images of celebrities wearing Montblanc jewelry.

Mike's Hard Lemonade celebrated its 17th birthday on April 13 in Los Angeles with a Guinness World Record-breaking stunt that involved lighting 50,151 candles on a giant cake for a marketing photo op. BeCore Experiential Marketing Agency produced the event, which took place at its outdoor space. The number of candles on the cake corresponded to the number of fans who engaged with a Facebook post.

New York's annual tasting event took place April 25 at 225 Liberty Street in Battery Park. A wall of orange helium balloons featuring the No Kid Hungry logo served as the backdrop for the event's main photo booth.

MSNBC hosted a White House Correspondents' Association Dinner after-party at the United States Institute of Peace on April 30. Saipancakes set up a custom pancake station that offered pancakes modeled after the current presidential candidates, as well as President Obama and First Lady Michelle Obama. Guests voted for their favorite using canisters and colored chips. Dufour & Co. produced the event.

Another White House Correspondents' Association Dinner event, The Washington Post's reception took place April 30 at the Washington Hilton. Qualcomm had guests interacting with 3-D technology as part of its Invisible Museum installation. When users pointed an iPad camera toward a building model on a pedestal, the technology created an adaptable 3-D rendering of a city on the screen.

For White House Correspondents' weekend, Independent Journal and Tinder had a Tinder-inspired high school yearbook theme for their "Swipe the Vote" party. The event, which took place April 28 at the W Hotel in Washington, featured voting booths where guests could swipe right to vote for the party's prom king and queen.

For an inventive way to incorporate flowers into an event, Bronson van Wyck of Van Wyck & Van Wyck designed a floral wall behind various auction items for the Foundation Fighting Blindness World Gala at New York’s Cipriani Wall Street in April.

This year's Social Media Marketing World took place April 17 to 19 at the San Diego Convention Center. At the opening night party, attendees played “Networking Bingo” by gathering Twitter handles of fellow guests that met the criteria indicated in the boxes. All completed cards were entered in drawings for prizes such as a ticket to the 2017 conference or a free annual pass to the Social Media Examiner membership site.