The third annual Georgetown Jingle welcomed a jolly crowd of more than 500 adults and kids on Sunday at the Four Seasons in Georgetown. Sponsored by the hotel, JDS Design Inc. and the Washington Design Center, the four-hour event offered a 200-item silent auction, live entertainment, food tastings from area restaurants, a craft workshop for children, and the display of 14 opulently decorated Christmas trees, which were the hot ticket items at the silent auction. The “Celebrity Tree,” chock full of signatures from the likes of Hillary Clinton, Barack Obama, Oprah Winfrey, and Eli Manning, sold for $5,000.
Created by local design teams, the trees were among the event’s big draws. Yet displaying them proved to be this year’s biggest obstacle. The Four Seasons is undergoing a lobby renovation. “Because the trees typically adorn the lobby area, we had to improvise and create a winter wonderland for [them],” said event host Julia Chappell. “HDO Productions hoisted a set of tents to cover the entire courtyard.” Among the trees, a three-piece band played bluesy holiday music and tuxedoed staff doled out flutes of champagne.
CVS sponsored the children’s workshop (which headed to a larger room this year to accommodate the crowds), providing everything from the kid-size red-and-white plastic chairs and a balloon artist to the two-foot-tall buffet table laden with kid-friendly treats, like square shot glasses filled with celery and carrot sticks. Tables were set up throughout the room to serve as craft and cookie-decorating stations for the kids.
Local restaurateurs provided the grown-up food for the event, each with their own table along the periphery of the hotel’s large ballroom. The offerings included crêpes from Café Bonaparte, banana-leaf tamales from Casa Oaxaca, and steak sandwiches from Morton’s.
Georgetown Jingle committee members and volunteers spread tables full of silent-auction items throughout the entire lower level, weaving them along hallways and into various small conference rooms. According to all the penciled-in names and competing bids, the most popular items were the autographed Hanna poster and an Italian hair-on-hide rug from Edelman Leather.
With ticket sales ($150 for adults; $50 for kids), the silent auction, cash sponsors, and in-kind donations, the Jingle raised more than $275,000 for the pediatric bone marrow transplant program at Georgetown University Hospital.
