Halloween

At the 2011 "Galaween" Benefit in Chicago, guests walked through a temporary graveyard outside of Venue One. Inside, the raw space was transformed into an enchanted forest foyer, a torture chamber dance floor, and a haunted mansion with rags hung from the ceiling’s chandeliers.

For the Central Park Conservancy's Halloween ball in 2010, Frank Alexander dressed tables in shades of brown and green and topped each one with alternating arrangements of tree stumps with hidden gnomes and fairies surrounded by flickering candles.

The look of the Lexus event during the 2011 New York International Auto Show might have been more futuristic than spooky, but the eerie glow of blue lighting and the fog coming out of the drinks works just as well for Halloween parties. Caterer Creative Edge served up a liquid nitrogen cocktail of vanilla Absolut with tangerine and a vanilla kumquat marmalade alongside passion fruit meringues dipped in a bowl of nitrogen for the carmaker's preview event.

Edward Gorey's morbid illustrations were the inspiration behind the design for the 2006 Central Park Conservancy Halloween ball. Inside the dining room, Grayson Bakula (a company that has since changed its name to Bakula Design) decorated the walls of the tent with projections of barren branches and hung menacing hooded figures from the ceiling.

At the 2009 Green Halloween launch, caterer Flavor Palette crafted a menu that included jack-o-lantern-, ghost-, and graveyard-inspired sushi.

Rather than creating elaborate centerpieces for the Central Park Conservancy's 2006 ball, Grayson Bakula (now known as Bakula Design) used intersected pieces of laser-cut plexiglass to form the ghostly dining table decorations.

Neuman's Halloween-themed table for the ISES competition at the 2010 BizBash New York Expo used skeleton hands napkin rings, mini coffins and cauldrons, and a barren hilltop centerpiece to set the eerie mood.

NYC Photobooth’s “Haunted Photocrypts” photo booth station includes an interactive talking skull to instruct visitors and a number of spooky backgrounds to choose from.

At The Simpsons Halloween-Carnival party in 2009, a mask-making station at the Barker Hangar in Los Angeles let kids and adults create their own face coverings as a unique event souvenir.

On October 24, Boston's Emerald Lounge at the Revere Hotel hosted a Zombie-themed fashion show with looks from Dance Party Massacre's fall line. Scenes from Night of the Living Dead played inside the lounge, and spooky swag included skull-shaped shot glasses from Crystal Head vodka.

Chad Hudson Events produced the October 24 premiere event and after-party for the new film Fun Size. Held at Marathon Park inside the Paramount Studios lot, the event was inspired by a typical, all-American Halloween festival. Illuminated jack-o'-lanterns, creepy trees and scarecrows from CHE and Jackson Shrub and Props, and lighting effects and spiderweb gobos from CHE and Ultimate Lighting created the festive atmosphere.

An actor wearing a fuzzy, monster-paw-like glove handed guests drinks from behind a curtain.