New York’s retail and real estate institutions have a long history of putting on holiday events and promotions to lure consumers and press attention, and this year brings a host of novel attractions to entice already busy shoppers. The mix of new stunts and classics blankets the city this month in twinkling lights, dazzling trees, festive store windows—and all the traffic-clogging, publicity-getting ceremonies, parades, and parties that go along with them.
Starting New Traditions
Macy’s—already a big name in holiday events—has beefed up its traditional holiday offerings. “We spent more money this year—and it’s different from what we’ve done traditionally,” said the department store’s group vice president of annual and special events, Robin Hall. In addition to its windows with animated New York holiday scenes, the retail giant also opened a seasonal vintage-looking toy shop adjacent to its “Santaland” attraction—unveiled on the Sunday before the store’s famous Thanksgiving Day parade with a party for kids starring entertainers from the Big Apple Circus and characters from the parade. At sunset, Macy’s lit up all its windows, decorations, and the lights in neighboring Herald Square Park in a celebration attended by thousands. [The shop is] "something that makes a tremendous amount of sense at this time of year," Hall says. “There were 250,000 kids visiting Santa, and there was some level of frustration on the part of shopping families that there was no place for the kids to shop [in years past]. [The toy shop] is doing very well.”
A new tradition was born at the Shops at Columbus Circle at Time Warner Center as well. Andrea Friedland, vice president of Columbus Circle Experiences, and Stacey Feder, the director of retail marketing at the shops, oversaw the implementation of a high-tech light system to adorn the center’s great hall. The lights are housed within 12 14-foot multi-pointed stars that hang at different levels. “We knew we wanted a dynamic holiday program to fit into the architecture and the [role of a] destination that the Time Warner Center is taking on,” Feder says. “We wanted to utilize the expanse of the great room and create a new tradition for the city and visitors.” The installation—the first holiday lights spectacle for the building—was created by Holiday Image Inc., which subcontracted Scharff Weisberg to help execute the project. It contains LED technology, fiber optics, and strobe lights to create layers of effects; the stars are also choreographed to interpretations of the Nutcracker Suite. With the center’s huge glass wall, the display is also visible from Columbus Circle. (The holiday decor also adorns the building’s event spaces.)
Rock Center—and Its Burgeoning Competition
New York’s most famous holiday spectacle (after the Thanksgiving parade, at least) is probably the Rockefeller Center tree lighting, and this year’s tree—a 74-foot-tall Norway spruce from Wayne, New Jersey, that weighs nine tons—was lit November 30 during a two-hour-long program cohosted by Al Roker and Will & Grace’s Megan Mullally that featured celebrity appearances and a musical lineup including Sheryl Crow; Rod Stewart; Earth, Wind, and Fire; Brian Wilson; Regis Philbin; the Goo Goo Dolls; and the Rockettes.
In a creative attempt to contend with Rockefeller Center, Bryant Park this year features a new 17,000-square-foot, free-to-the-public ice-skating rink called the Pond, presented by sponsor Citi. According to Daniel Biederman, president of the Bryant Park Restoration Corporation, the rink helped make the park useful in a time when it’s otherwise underused. “It fills an entertainment hole and makes Bryant Park useful 12 months a year,” Biederman says.
Alongside the rink is Bryant Park’s holiday market, the Fêtes de Noël, an annual tradition since 2002. The festivities include holiday shops in the park, an outdoor market filled with decorations, lights, and a giant tree (similar to the holiday market downtown in Union Square). The market will be open until New Year’s Day. Levy Lighting created a light show paired with the lighting of the tree, which is sponsored by Kenneth Cole in conjunction with World AIDS Day. (Cole is the current president of Amfar.) The tree features 800 silver medallions bearing AIDS awareness slogans. Levy installed four giant light towers with nearly 100 light fixtures that flash and change color. A computerized system controls the show, which runs until January 2.
Time Warner Center neighbor Lincoln Center and the Lincoln Square Business Improvement District (BID) transformed that area into a wintry playground for the public with two separate events that looked like one seamless production to the people who turned out for it. Immediately following Lincoln Center’s tree lighting ceremony on November 28, the Lincoln Square BID hosted its sixth annual “Winter’s Eve at Lincoln Square” event, a neighborhood celebration featuring free entertainment, kids’ activities, outdoor food tastings, and shopping promotions at local retail stores.
“Each year we see a greater coming together of what is basically two events,” says Lincoln Square BID president Monica Blum. “We started our event years ago when I went to the tree lighting and I heard people say, ‘What do we do now?’ We give them something to do.” Sidewalks featured live performances by local choruses and bands, jugglers, stiltwalkers, blues musician John Hammond, jazz singer Jamie Leonhart, classical violinist Joshua Bell, and readings from A Christmas Carol in the new circle. Restaurants and vendors including Bar Masa, Tavern on the Green, Rosa Mexicano, Josephina, Dean & DeLuca, Godiva chocolatier, and Williams-Sonoma offered tastings. “Winter’s Eve is unusual because we use what people don’t typically think about as entertainment venues—in the Morman church, we turn the gym into a black box [theater], and we turn the Harmony Atrium into kiddie central with children’s performers and entertainment,” Blum says. “It turns the neighborhood into a small town for an evening. If we’re not rivaling Rock Center yet, we will. It’s getting bigger.”
Traffic-Stopping Events
Nearby, Mother Nature did her best to foil Saks Fifth Avenue’s “Snowflake Spectacular” window opening ceremony, but it was spectacular nonetheless. On account of rain Saks vice president of special events Caroline Dougherty forwent the planned fireworks, but forged ahead with the rest of the show, produced by AO Production. GSS Security blocked off all traffic on Fifth Avenue for nearly two minutes during rush hour for a short Nutcracker performance by American Ballet Theatre students in the middle of the wet street. (Saks made a donation to the Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis school at ABT to mark the occasion.) Meanwhile, traffic backed up clear into the 90’s. (“It was no easy feat,” says AO’s Owen Davidson. “We created the first real gridlock of the [holiday] season.”)
Afterward—as the assembled throng of media sipped hot chocolate and nibbled sugar cookies from Restaurant Associates—the 50 giant snowflakes from American Christmas adorning the department store’s edifice lit up in white lights in time to music piped in from technical producer Bernhard-Link Theatrical. (The ambitious project included 72,000 LED modules, 15 uplights, 40 strobes, and 13,000 feet of cable.) Jauchem & Meech blew in sudsy fake snow with industrial fans. When it was all over, journalists joined the dancers at a small cocktail party on the department store’s seventh floor, where sparkly snowflakes dotted tabletops and vases of red berries from Raul Avila flanked the bar. A lovely outdoor garden all decked with rain-extinguished candles was open, but most guests stayed indoors.
If the Saks event was high class, the scene is a bit cheesier downtown for the “Sorrento Cheese Christmas in Little Italy” celebration hosted by the Little Italy Merchants Association. (What’s up with title sponsor Sorrento, you ask? “The summer and Christmas festivals are the premier events of Sorrento’s yearlong efforts to support Italian-American culture and heritage in communities,” says Fred Hermann, Sorrento’s corporate director of marketing.) The three-week holiday celebration began December 2, setting the streets of Little Italy ablaze with holiday lights and colorful decorations. A 20-foot-tall Christmas tree will be lit during a ceremony on December 9 with colorful holiday decorations in the patio of Most Precious Blood Church on Mulberry Street, and the festival will feature weekly parades on Saturday afternoons. “Since its introduction in 2001, this festival has become one of the major holiday attractions in [the city],” says Robert Ianniello Jr., president of the Little Italy Merchants Association. “Thousands of visitors and tourists [attend], [and] the festive atmosphere has also instilled a new sense of pride in the community.”
—Alesandra Dubin & Mark Mavrigian
Photo: James Edstrom (rink)
Posted 12.07.05
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Starting New Traditions
Macy’s—already a big name in holiday events—has beefed up its traditional holiday offerings. “We spent more money this year—and it’s different from what we’ve done traditionally,” said the department store’s group vice president of annual and special events, Robin Hall. In addition to its windows with animated New York holiday scenes, the retail giant also opened a seasonal vintage-looking toy shop adjacent to its “Santaland” attraction—unveiled on the Sunday before the store’s famous Thanksgiving Day parade with a party for kids starring entertainers from the Big Apple Circus and characters from the parade. At sunset, Macy’s lit up all its windows, decorations, and the lights in neighboring Herald Square Park in a celebration attended by thousands. [The shop is] "something that makes a tremendous amount of sense at this time of year," Hall says. “There were 250,000 kids visiting Santa, and there was some level of frustration on the part of shopping families that there was no place for the kids to shop [in years past]. [The toy shop] is doing very well.”
A new tradition was born at the Shops at Columbus Circle at Time Warner Center as well. Andrea Friedland, vice president of Columbus Circle Experiences, and Stacey Feder, the director of retail marketing at the shops, oversaw the implementation of a high-tech light system to adorn the center’s great hall. The lights are housed within 12 14-foot multi-pointed stars that hang at different levels. “We knew we wanted a dynamic holiday program to fit into the architecture and the [role of a] destination that the Time Warner Center is taking on,” Feder says. “We wanted to utilize the expanse of the great room and create a new tradition for the city and visitors.” The installation—the first holiday lights spectacle for the building—was created by Holiday Image Inc., which subcontracted Scharff Weisberg to help execute the project. It contains LED technology, fiber optics, and strobe lights to create layers of effects; the stars are also choreographed to interpretations of the Nutcracker Suite. With the center’s huge glass wall, the display is also visible from Columbus Circle. (The holiday decor also adorns the building’s event spaces.)
Rock Center—and Its Burgeoning Competition
New York’s most famous holiday spectacle (after the Thanksgiving parade, at least) is probably the Rockefeller Center tree lighting, and this year’s tree—a 74-foot-tall Norway spruce from Wayne, New Jersey, that weighs nine tons—was lit November 30 during a two-hour-long program cohosted by Al Roker and Will & Grace’s Megan Mullally that featured celebrity appearances and a musical lineup including Sheryl Crow; Rod Stewart; Earth, Wind, and Fire; Brian Wilson; Regis Philbin; the Goo Goo Dolls; and the Rockettes.
In a creative attempt to contend with Rockefeller Center, Bryant Park this year features a new 17,000-square-foot, free-to-the-public ice-skating rink called the Pond, presented by sponsor Citi. According to Daniel Biederman, president of the Bryant Park Restoration Corporation, the rink helped make the park useful in a time when it’s otherwise underused. “It fills an entertainment hole and makes Bryant Park useful 12 months a year,” Biederman says.
Alongside the rink is Bryant Park’s holiday market, the Fêtes de Noël, an annual tradition since 2002. The festivities include holiday shops in the park, an outdoor market filled with decorations, lights, and a giant tree (similar to the holiday market downtown in Union Square). The market will be open until New Year’s Day. Levy Lighting created a light show paired with the lighting of the tree, which is sponsored by Kenneth Cole in conjunction with World AIDS Day. (Cole is the current president of Amfar.) The tree features 800 silver medallions bearing AIDS awareness slogans. Levy installed four giant light towers with nearly 100 light fixtures that flash and change color. A computerized system controls the show, which runs until January 2.
Time Warner Center neighbor Lincoln Center and the Lincoln Square Business Improvement District (BID) transformed that area into a wintry playground for the public with two separate events that looked like one seamless production to the people who turned out for it. Immediately following Lincoln Center’s tree lighting ceremony on November 28, the Lincoln Square BID hosted its sixth annual “Winter’s Eve at Lincoln Square” event, a neighborhood celebration featuring free entertainment, kids’ activities, outdoor food tastings, and shopping promotions at local retail stores.
“Each year we see a greater coming together of what is basically two events,” says Lincoln Square BID president Monica Blum. “We started our event years ago when I went to the tree lighting and I heard people say, ‘What do we do now?’ We give them something to do.” Sidewalks featured live performances by local choruses and bands, jugglers, stiltwalkers, blues musician John Hammond, jazz singer Jamie Leonhart, classical violinist Joshua Bell, and readings from A Christmas Carol in the new circle. Restaurants and vendors including Bar Masa, Tavern on the Green, Rosa Mexicano, Josephina, Dean & DeLuca, Godiva chocolatier, and Williams-Sonoma offered tastings. “Winter’s Eve is unusual because we use what people don’t typically think about as entertainment venues—in the Morman church, we turn the gym into a black box [theater], and we turn the Harmony Atrium into kiddie central with children’s performers and entertainment,” Blum says. “It turns the neighborhood into a small town for an evening. If we’re not rivaling Rock Center yet, we will. It’s getting bigger.”
Traffic-Stopping Events
Nearby, Mother Nature did her best to foil Saks Fifth Avenue’s “Snowflake Spectacular” window opening ceremony, but it was spectacular nonetheless. On account of rain Saks vice president of special events Caroline Dougherty forwent the planned fireworks, but forged ahead with the rest of the show, produced by AO Production. GSS Security blocked off all traffic on Fifth Avenue for nearly two minutes during rush hour for a short Nutcracker performance by American Ballet Theatre students in the middle of the wet street. (Saks made a donation to the Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis school at ABT to mark the occasion.) Meanwhile, traffic backed up clear into the 90’s. (“It was no easy feat,” says AO’s Owen Davidson. “We created the first real gridlock of the [holiday] season.”)
Afterward—as the assembled throng of media sipped hot chocolate and nibbled sugar cookies from Restaurant Associates—the 50 giant snowflakes from American Christmas adorning the department store’s edifice lit up in white lights in time to music piped in from technical producer Bernhard-Link Theatrical. (The ambitious project included 72,000 LED modules, 15 uplights, 40 strobes, and 13,000 feet of cable.) Jauchem & Meech blew in sudsy fake snow with industrial fans. When it was all over, journalists joined the dancers at a small cocktail party on the department store’s seventh floor, where sparkly snowflakes dotted tabletops and vases of red berries from Raul Avila flanked the bar. A lovely outdoor garden all decked with rain-extinguished candles was open, but most guests stayed indoors.
If the Saks event was high class, the scene is a bit cheesier downtown for the “Sorrento Cheese Christmas in Little Italy” celebration hosted by the Little Italy Merchants Association. (What’s up with title sponsor Sorrento, you ask? “The summer and Christmas festivals are the premier events of Sorrento’s yearlong efforts to support Italian-American culture and heritage in communities,” says Fred Hermann, Sorrento’s corporate director of marketing.) The three-week holiday celebration began December 2, setting the streets of Little Italy ablaze with holiday lights and colorful decorations. A 20-foot-tall Christmas tree will be lit during a ceremony on December 9 with colorful holiday decorations in the patio of Most Precious Blood Church on Mulberry Street, and the festival will feature weekly parades on Saturday afternoons. “Since its introduction in 2001, this festival has become one of the major holiday attractions in [the city],” says Robert Ianniello Jr., president of the Little Italy Merchants Association. “Thousands of visitors and tourists [attend], [and] the festive atmosphere has also instilled a new sense of pride in the community.”
—Alesandra Dubin & Mark Mavrigian
Photo: James Edstrom (rink)
Posted 12.07.05
Related Stories
Ideas for Corporate Holiday Parties
Corporate Holiday Parties Bounce Back (Finally)