One of the goals of the gala was to raise awareness for Medair, a humanitarian organization that brings life-saving relief to more than 1.6 million people every year, in places like South Sudan, DR Congo, Afghanistan, and Syria.
Photo: Kent Miller
Fiber-optic panels hung from the roof of the City of Hope gala tent to create the look of a starlit sky.
Photo:Â Line 8 Photography
The tribute journal was blown up and presented in the style of sheet music.
Photo: Â Line 8 Photography
WWF Canada’s Pandamonium
World Wildlife Fund Canada's inaugural Pandamonium fund-raiser took place in June at Andrew Richard Designs in Toronto. Toronto cocktail bar BarChef offered guests cocktails from a garden-like station inspired by the event's theme, "Doom & Bloom," celebrating the resilience of nature.
Photo: Katherine Holland
Apollo Theater’s Spring Gala
The evening culminated with an after-party held in a tent designed by event planner and Apollo board member Bronson van Wyck and featured a special “Let’s Go Crazy” dance tribute with a dedicated DJ set of Prince songs. The event raised $1.7 million for the Harlem theater’s artistic and community programming initiatives.
Photo: Shahar Azran
Lincoln Park Zoo’s Zoo Ball
The 39th annual Zoo Ball, presented by the Women's Board of the Lincoln Park Zoo, was held in Chicago in July. Dubbed “Penguins in Paradise,” the black-tie event was inspired by the endangered African penguins that will move into the zoo in the fall and featured nods to the birds, including a lemon parfait dessert with fresh berries that was accompanied by glowing penguin ornaments.
Photo: Alain Milotti
Steppenwolf Gala
Event Creative did the decor for Chicago's Steppenwolf Gala in early May, bringing what designer Jeffrey Foster called a "dark and sexy" decor scheme to a raw event space. Arty light fixtures featured lightbulbs in wire spheres, and strands of lights hung from the ceiling.Â
Photo: Kyle Flubacker
During dinner, guests were immersed in a series of large-scale projections that portrayed Jerusalem scenes. The projections slowly and subtly transitioned from day to night over the course of the meal, surprising guests.
Photo: Nadine Froger Photography
The Ride Foundation’s Dance for Africa
The Ride Foundation’s inaugural gala titled “Dance for Africa,” which was held July 23 at Boulevard3 in Los Angeles, featured dance, vocal, and artistic performances, as well as Africa-theme food and decor. Dancing with the Stars’ Karina Smirnoff served as the headline performer, while artist Brian Olsen opened the evening by live painting three pieces, including one of Nelson Mandela, all choreographed to music. The event benefited the African Wildlife Foundation.
Photo: Courtesy of the Ride Foundation
San Francisco Symphony's 106th Opening-Night Gala
The San Francisco Symphony's gala, which was held September 14 at San Francisco City Hall, featured four concurrent dinners. The largest one was the colorful patron’s dinner, which was housed in a 12,000-square-foot tent erected next to Davies Symphony Hall. The Blueprint Studios-designed space was inspired by modern chinoiserie art and fashion.
Photo: Show Ready Photo
The painting of St. Basil’s Cathedral in Moscow by Russian artist Simon Kozhin was projected on the walls of the dining space, setting the tone for the evening’s “Holiday Treasures from Russia” theme.
Photo: Russell Hirshon/Choral Arts
Floral arrangements, fabrics, and light projections all incorporated rich shades of gold and red.
Photo: Russell Hirshon/Choral Arts
Chandeliers hung over the dining room’s two long tables.
Photo: Russell Hirshon/Choral Arts
To accommodate all 600 guests, the seating plan incorporated rooms adjacent to the main dining space.
Photo: Russell Hirshon/Choral Arts
Servers carried trays of martinis with olives and trays of lemon drop martinis.
Photo: Stephen Elliot/Choral Arts
Restaurant Associates served smoked salmon napoleon as the first course, which was already plated as guests entered the Roof Terrace.
Photo: Russell Hirshon/Choral Arts
The band 'Round Midnight played Christmas classics, pop hits, and oldies, attracting dancers after the three-course dinner.
Photo: Russell Hirshon/Choral Arts
After entering the museum under the wings of the space shuttle Endeavour, guests made their way to the main building for the cocktail reception, done up to look like the desert just outside of Jerusalem where the scrolls were buried in caves for 2,000 years. The production team's goal was to give the area the look and feel of ancient times.
Photo: Nadine Froger Photography
During the cocktail reception, goats and a costumed shepherd invited guest interaction and also served as a photo op.
Photo: Nadine Froger Photography
During the cocktail reception, the street artist Retna painted works live alongside kids, many of whom were from local community programs.
Photo: Nadine Froger Photography
On the dinner tables, C.J. Matsumoto's arrangements alternated between short and tall, and varying tablecloths in six colors evoked the hues of Jerusalem.
Photo: Nadine Froger Photography
An aerialist floated adjacent to a large-scale projection of Marc Chagall stained-glass artwork, which covered an entire two-story wall in the main building.
Photo: Nadine Froger Photography
After dinner, the gala traditionally allows guests to return to visit the exhibit upstairs, catch the Imax movie in the theater, or stay for the after-party. This year, the party area was meant to simulate a Bedouin village.
Photo: Nadine Froger Photography
A drummer from Lucent Dossier used dramatic pyro elements to get guests' attention.
Photo: Nadine Froger Photography
In the all-black cocktail reception space, Piers Baker from Third from the Sun spun on the DJ Kreemy Booth, designed by Karim Rashid.
Photo: George Pimentel
In the cocktail reception space, ovoid ice sculpture centrepieces sat on every cocktail table. The fluid, organic shapes were inspired by the work of all three designers.
Photo: BizBash
Hundreds of balloons from Balloon Trix hung from the ceiling during the V.I.P. dinner. The space changed colour with each course, starting with blue, morphing to pink for the main course, changing to orange for dessert, and ending in red.
Photo: George Pimentel
Clear ghost chairs and white tablecloths created clean lines in the V.I.P. dining room. Seventy-five cymbidium orchids made up the centrepiece at each table, mimicking the circular balloons overhead.
Photo: George Pimentel
Glass votives with electric candles hung from the ceiling in the V.I.P. dining room.
Photo: BizBash
Eatertainment designed the V.I.P. menu and played with the colours and shapes from the event invitation. Each plate had the name of the dish and the spirograph design from the invitation across the top. For the first course, they served cider braised beet with poached pear, Benedictine blue and spicy candied pecan, and an herb salad with raspberry vinaigrette.
Photo: George Pimentel
For the after-party, Iceculture created an eight-foot ice wall at the entrance of the trading floor. Iconic shapes from Karim Rashid were cut into the ice blocks and packed with snow. The negative space spelled out "DX."
Photo: George Pimentel
Silver and copper spheres hung from a square truss structure over the trading floor. An eight-foot lampshade from Eurolites illuminated the bar.
Photo: George Pimentel
Large cubes of ice with a hollow sphere sat on the corners of the square bar on the trading floor.
Photo: BizBash
Large ice replicas of Karim Rashid's Garbino garbage can were placed on the bar on the trading floor. Large spherical ice cubes filled the bins. A single spherical ice cube was served in each drink.
Photo: BizBash
Iceculture created a candleholder and flower piece, which is a larger version of designer Hani Rashid's Alessi pencil holder.
Photo: BizBash
Box Top Productions designed the three-dimensional mappings projected on the walls of the trading floor.
Photo: George Pimentel
Crystal Head Vodka sponsored the event and served specialty cocktails from a bar on the trading floor. Ice skulls decorated the bar.
Photo: George Pimentel
Contortionists and acrobats from Zero Gravity Circus performed on stage on the trading floor. Aerialists also performed over the Crystal Head martini bar.
Photo: BizBash
Sponsor Cambria had models showing off the brand's tile designs with a fashion show during the after-party.
Photo: George Pimentel
Karim Rashid's Garbino garbage can, supplied by Umbra, acted as gift bags for guests.
Photo: George Pimentel
The silent auction was located on the first floor of the Design Exchange.
Photo: George Pimentel
Dancers from DLM Studio wearing bodysuits circulated the trading floor, interacting with guests, posing for photos, and dancing.
Photo: George Pimentel
A sign near the registration area was designed to look like the one on the original New York supper club.
Photo: Ryan Sjostrom
A red carpet, overhung with black drapes, lined the entrance to the cocktail reception.
Photo: Ryan Sjostrom
The co-chairs wanted a four-sided, centralized bar to avoid lines.
Photo: Ryan Sjostrom
A silent auction offered tickets to New York Fashion Week and a Golden Globes after-party, as well as vacations and gift certificates for restaurants such as the Pump Room.
Photo: Ryan Sjostrom
Models from Zzazz Productions dressed as cigarette girls.
Photo: Ryan Sjostrom
Palm trees decorated the cocktail area.
Photo: Ryan Sjostrom
Palm leaves, lilies, and zebra print decorated the ballroom, where 430 guests sat to dinner.
Photo: Ryan Sjostrom
Kehoe Designs handled decor.
Photo: Ryan Sjostrom
Black lamps, reminiscent of old-school supper clubs, decorated tables along with flower arrangements.
Photo: Ryan Sjostrom
The Ken Arlen Orchestra performed while guests danced on a glossy, patterned floor.
Photo: Ryan Sjostrom
Chicago hosted the U.S. Travel Association’s IPW conference in 2014. At the splashy opening-night party, hanging letters and signs served to divide the space and add a sense of intimacy throughout.
Photo: Timothy Musho Photography
At Food & Wine’s Best New Chefs event in 2014, organizers eschewed a traditional red carpet in favor of stairs leading to the event space emblazoned with a custom typography message bearing the name of the occasion.
Photo: Carolyn Curtis for BizBash
In 2013, New York’s famous Costume Institute gala had a punk-inspired theme. Nodding to the genre’s British and American origins, designers dressed the museum’s staircase with American and British flags made entirely of 150,000 red, white, and blue roses.
Photo: Courtesy of the Metropolitan Museum of Art/BFAnyc.com
At the Corcoran Gallery of Art gala in Washington in 2012, a baroque-style gobo decked out the museum’s grand staircase, which is lined with marble statues and busts.
Photo: Tony Brown/imijphoto.com
In its first year in Canada, 2014, the TED conference decked Vancouver Convention Center's stairs with color-blocked sections printed with the conference's tagline, "The next chapter starts here.”
Photo: Bret Hartman
Saveur hosted its Summer BBQ in New York in 2014. To get attendees excited about what would greet them within the outdoor culinary event, the words "cocktails," "sweets," "photo booth," "music” and others decorated a staircase.
Photo: Beth Kormanik/BizBash
Each year, E3 takes over multiple halls in the Los Angeles Convention Center, as well as its lobby areas and on the plazas outside. The show and its vendors take over stairs for marketing and branding, as in this example from 2013, which used both the stairs and surrounding columns.
Photo: Alesandra Dubin/BizBash
Cole Haan took to New York in 2012 to introduce its Chelsea Pump, marketed as a shoe that can be worn late into the night. As part of the brand’s “Don’t Go Home” campaign, it hosted dance parties at a venue where the stairs bore messages announcing reasons to stay out late.
Photo: David X Prutting/BFAnyc.com
Event designer David Beahm used votive candles in a snaking pattern down the the Metropolitan Museum of Art’s stairs for a private corporate event.
Photo: Courtesy of David Beahm
In a more straightforward take on the look, a display of 1,200 votive candles lined the stairs in the Great Hall at the Metropolitan Museum of Art at the opening-night party for Bullets Over Broadway in New York in 2014, greeting the 900 guests as they arrived from the St. James Theatre.
Photo: Carolyn Curtis for BizBash
Sabra Dipping Company set up a pop-up dining experience called Hummus House in Washington in 2014. Within the space, stairs leading to the second floor were decorated with pots containing dried vegetables meant to represent various flavors of the brand’s hummus.
Photo: Glossy Creative
Moët & Chandon was the official champagne partner for Sex and the City 2, and as such, the brand worked with Warner Brothers to host an advance screening of the sequel at the Gene Siskel Film Center in Chicago in 2010. The brand decorated the stairs at the venue with branded stars reminiscent of the Hollywood Boulevard Walk of Fame.
Photo: Bob Carl
Engadget hosted a meet-up for its readers in New York in 2011. Not missing an opportunity to brand the venue for 1,400 guests walking the stairs, the AOL-owned tech blog used them as surfaces on which to plaster its logo.
Photo: Jika González for BizBash
The Museum of Modern Art’s annual Party in the Garden in New York in 2013 had a modern, tropical motif. Accordingly, the arrivals backdrop included plenty of greenery, which was accented with logos from MoMA and sponsor Cartier.
Photo: Nadia Chaudhury/BizBash
The campaign tagline was incorporated through various aspects of the event design, including drink stirrers and catering trays.
Photo: Nadia Chaudhury/BizBash
And don't forget dessert, of course. An array of guilt-free options is available at the Westin Galleria Dallas, including dairy-free dark chocolate mousse with blueberry compote (pictured), a fresh fruit martini topped with non-dairy chantilly, honey yogurt with toasted pecans, and dairy-free strawberry mousse with granola crumbles.
Photo: Courtesy of the Westin Galleria Dallas
Art of Everyone
Art of Everyone’s crowd-sourced, laser-guided painting experience allows any audience to create a masterpiece. As the artist conductor outlines an image on a large canvas using a laser pointer, participants stand on the other side of the canvas and apply paint, following the direction of the laser. Art of Everyone is fully customizable and is available for small intimate settings as well as large activations that can include multiple locations. The team of artists specializes in various forms of art, from portrait, abstract, landscape, still life, and more. Pricing is available upon request.
Photo: Taylor McIntyre/BizBash
Tacos With International-Inspired Fillings
Chicago-based Fig Catering noted that the taco trend isn't going anywhere—but expect more unique fillings, rather than standard Mexican fare. Taco fusions could include Korean kalbi, fried Italian peppers, Mediterranean lamb and harissa, and Japanese uni seaweed.Â
Photo: Courtesy of Fig Catering
