It was a delight to celebrate creative collaboration between music and fashion at last Wednesday's Black Tie Salon, hosted by the After Arts Group. Everyone was dressed in their finest, and the panoramic Hudson River views from the 86th floor of 35 Hudson Yards brought gasps of appreciation. Walk through the event with us, and find out what everyone was wearing!
Two mannequins on display showing custom designs by Jenny Lai for percussionist Mike Truesdell (left) and bassoonist Rebekah Heller (right)
_
The evening started with a lively conversation between After Arts founder, Nicholas King and designer Jenny Lai. They chatted about Jenny's childhood immersed in the performing arts, how she began designing for musicians, and how far-ranging collaborations with illustrators and puppet theater keep her on her toes.
_
For the first musical performance of the evening, Jenny invited two incredible NY Philharmonic musicians, violinist Audrey Wright and violist Cong Wu who performed an eclectic and rousing pairing of dances from Mozart and Mark O'Connor. The duo were dressed in styles from NOT's ready-to-wear collection, showing how contemporary musicians are pushing the envelope on the standard attire of classical musicians.
Audrey Wright is wearing For the second musical performance, Jenny welcomed MacArthur fellow, flutist Claire Chase on stage to showcase a custom outfit. Claire performed excerpts from Marcos Balter's 'PAN', where she performs in a custom outfit designed by Jenny Lai. Claire and Jenny chatted about the process of coming up with this minimal, stylish, and functional design inspired by Pan, Greek god of the wild. Claire surprised the audience by inviting eight audience members to pick up triangles and to participate as musicians in the piece! The sounds of the twinkling triangles filled the room with magic.
_
For the third performance, Jenny welcomed her good friends and frequent collaborators - violinist Audrey Wright and artist Geoff Robertson to take the stage. They introduced their project Luminous Being, a collaboration of sound and light. Geoff, the artist and engineer of the project, introduced some of the unique skillsets he had to learn in order to create this sound-responsive light suit (including sewing!), while Audrey spoke of the challenges of curating and composing. With the lights turned off and the city all ablaze through floor-to-ceiling windows, their performance brought the audience to hushed awe.
Thank you for following along these moments from a special evening! So much appreciation for the talented musicians that inspire NOT's work, and to the dedicated team at After Arts for bringing us all together for this celebration.
