2017 HP

Signage meant to evoke road signs pointed guests to the various activities and offerings within the Old Navy preview event.

AT&T’s Best of Washington event hosted by Washingtonian magazine in 2013 had staffers dressed in vintage airline stewardess uniforms lining the main entrance, directing guests inside as air traffic controllers might direct planes.

Design Industries Foundation Fighting AIDS’s Dining by Design event in Chicago in November included multiple tables with travel themes. One, designed by Gunlocke/HBF, had miniature hot-air balloons soaring above it, as well as a globe, clocks, and maps as decoration.

Another Diffa table, from Leopardo by VOA, recalled a Moroccan train car with wooden tables, topped with Moroccan tea glasses, which stood beside windows that appeared to reveal passing scenery.

For a wedding at Union Station in Los Angeles, Sterling Engagements displayed escort cards printed to look like train tickets inside vintage suitcases.

Earlier this month in New York, Jose Cuervo set up a pop-up experiential promotion made from repurposed aircraft parts. The lounge, known as the Rolling Stone Tour Plane Experience, was one segment of a broader campaign for the brand, inspired by the Rolling Stones' rowdy 1972 tour. The tour plane, featuring the band’s unmistakable logo, was the inspiration for the Air Hollywood installation.

For its 2009 Once Upon a Time gala in Chicago, the Children's Place Association printed table numbers on cards designed to look like passports.

Variety and British Airways hosted a Los Angeles event in 2013—at a $30 million private manse—meant to celebrate the publication's “10 Brits to Watch” feature as well as the airline's nonstop service between Los Angeles International Airport and Heathrow Airport on the A380. In the photo op area, guests could highlight the destinations they most wanted to visit by pinning their image to a map board.

Old Navy previewed its spring 2015 collection in New York last year with a road-trip-theme event, where guests could choose their own on-theme backdrops. They then took home prints of the images stamped to look like postcards.

The American Cancer Society’s Discovery Ball in 2013 in Chicago was dubbed “Passport to Discovery” and had a time-travel theme. As a nod to the nonprofit’s 100-year past, as well as its present and future, the fund-raiser drew inspiration from an old-fashioned train station, with props and decor including suitcases, trunks, and old street lamps. The registration desk was decorated to resemble a ticket counter.

In 2008, the women's board of the Chicago Horticultural Society hosted a dinner known as “All Aboard! Wonderland Express," which raised money for a plant conservation science center at the Chicago Botanic Garden. The event drew its inspiration from an indoor model-train exhibition filled with replicas of Chicago landmarks. To go along with the train theme, catering staff wore conductor caps.

To match the train theme at the Chicago Botanic Garden event, lampshades bore map imagery, clock numbers and gears wrapped tall lamps, and suitcases were stacked inside the bars.

Stella Artois launched its "Host Beautifully" campaign in Los Angeles in May with an open-air event where guests could float above the crowd in tethered hot-air balloons that were branded with the beer brand’s logo.

The grand opening of the Miami Airport Convention Center in 2012 served airplane tacos, hand-cut tortilla shells created to look like paper airplanes.

The Chicago-based company held its massive holiday party at Chicago's Aragon Ballroom on December 14. Event Creative's decor included 8- by 12-foot masquerade masks, which had illuminated, color-changing crystal columns as "handles." Event Creative created patterned gobos meant to look like the draped materials on a Mardi Gras float and collaborated with Sound Investment on the lighting.

On November 12, the beer brand took over New York's Masonic Hall with a masquerade-themed promotion. Mirrorball produced the event and brought the theme to life with costumed actors wearing elephant trunks, Marie Antoinette-style wigs, and masks.

Wearing white body paint to match the tufted bar, actors crouched on pedestals surrounded by candles. Purple lighting added to the moody, Gothic effect.

The Breeders' Cup, the unofficial end to the thoroughbred-racing season, took over Santa Anita Park on November 2 and 3. Kicking off all the festivities and welcoming the event back to the region was a reception at the mayor's residence, the Getty House, on Halloween night. Brown Hot Events' deep purple, masquerade-inspired design for the affair included a welcome table at the entrance with 300 designer masks from which guests could select.

Chandeliers encased in Lucite made for eye-catching high-top tables in the bar area.

CyberCoders hosted its annual holiday party at Newport Beach Dunes Resort on December 15. At the entrance to the masquerade-themed event, a performer on stilts ambled down a purple carpet. The event's logo, a feathered mask, appeared in lights on the wall. Kapture Vision handled production.