Parties & Celebrations
Lunch at the Guggenheim
I really love a good challenge, especially one with so many parts. Designing and producing this party was one of my ultimate challenges. First of all, since it was for a high profile crowd of fashionistas, well-heeled NY society, and elite press, it had to be über chic. It also had to be a huge success because it was for InStyle magazine, and since it was at the Guggenheim Museum which is a public space, we had a very short window of time to set everything up, install the entire event, have lunch, and break the party down by 3.30 p.m.
At the time of this party, I was a contributing editor with InStyle and I was hired by Martha Nelson, then managing editor, to design a luncheon for the opening of the Armani retrospective at the Guggenheim Museum in New York City. The Guggenheim is a landmark building right across from the park on 5th Avenue in Manhattan. It is a spectacular building designed by Frank Lloyd Wright. Aside from its world-class exhibits, the building is known for its spiraling layout, with walkways winding around the perimeter of each floor, so from any vantage point, visitors can look down to the ground level, which is where we set up our lunch tables.
Why was it such a challenge? It was a very ambitious plan in that it had to be pulled off with military procedure. And with true military precision we pulled it off. A lot of the detail went into the intricate planning and in finding the pieces and assembling the centerpieces. Plans were pored over for weeks on end. When the day finally arrived, crews of people moved en masse, and in an incredibly synchronized manner, we set five long banquet tables. We’d laid down the base cloths of Dupioni silk, placed our sumptuous Portuguese linen table runners down the center of our tables (I’d found these in a mail-order catalogue at a trade show), and last but not least, created our centerpieces.
The centerpiece really was an installation of various different geometric shaped glass and ceramic containers placed at right angles to one another. I thought they were very befitting of the style of how we should decorate the installation seeing that we were at a museum. It was the sum of many different parts. Imagine: different-colored and different-sized porcelain containers from Portugal in matte shades of gray and white, mixed and matched with square and rectangular jet-black glass vases of varying heights. Every single one of these containers held one particular type of green flower. The effect was wonderfully architectural. Some were packed with bear grass shaved neatly across the top, others with cabbage patches, still others with shamrock spider mums…and all were studded down below with amber votive candles.
To further animate our centerpieces, I added a final chic touch, laying down an assortment of slender ceramic trays filled with luminous green olives, platters of crunchy crostini bread sticks, and a choice of salty and sweet butters. And since our crowd was such a well-heeled fashionista crowd – forever on the run! – we completed our lunch in an hour and 45 minutes (which even included a quick speech). On the menu? A delicious light tomato soup, followed by an amazing salad with crispy greens, fresh herbs, haricots verts, and grilled salmon. Our ever-so-chic dessert swooped in on black plates, with InStyle inscribed in white sugar, paired with a simple, savory sweet wine. Voila!
The encore for my team? A race against time. By the time the last guests had departed, we had less than an hour to completely break down and restore the room to its original condition. How we accomplished this I still don’t know, but my team pulled it off with the same grace and precision with which they’d set up our glamorous installation. To say the entire day felt like a dream is an understatement. It was chic. It was fast. It was furious. It was definitely InStyle. And all of us agreed, it reached a high point, and ended just as quickly.
As always, there's more to come!
