Re-cap of the Book Discussion with Nina Garcia at Barnes & Noble

Before I give you a re-cap of last night’s event, I just have to say thank you to everyone who came out to Barnes & Noble. It was an extraordinary evening, and even though I’ve given hundreds of talks, I still get a little nervous before each event. It helped that I had such a wonderful interviewer and companion on stage, Nina Garcia. Once I’m surrounded by the excitement and energy of the others around me (Nina, the guests, my wonderful family who also came last night) I’m ready to get out there and give my all.

After answering a series of insightful questions by Nina, mostly covering how I got started in the business, what my design process is and where I draw inspiration from, we played a game called the “Or Game.” It was a series of questions—Lilies or orchids? Uptown or Downtown? Prada or Gucci?---designed to help the audience get to know me better. Can anyone guess what my answers were to some of these questions? I’ll give you one hint—I didn’t answer lilies.

Biyan, one of the best designers in Indonesia, even came out to the event. (Check out our accidentally matching Prada shoes!)

Then we took questions from the audience, and I want to share some of the answers here with you. One lovely woman mentioned that she’s been designing a lot of corporate events but wanted to get more into designing weddings and social events. She asked for some guidance on how to break in.

 My advice? Just start doing it. Start off by designing weddings for your friends and family. Learn from each experience and build your knowledge base from there. Wherever you go, keep your ears and eyes out for people looking for help planning or designing their wedding. Offer your services, and before you know it, it you’ll build up a list of clientele and a portfolio of some amazing events.

I really believe in the power of doing and knowing that the only way to get started is to get out there, create, and be comfortable with making mistakes. I’ve made mistakes, we all do, and the most important thing to do is just to turn each mistake into a learning lesson, fix what you did wrong, and make yourself better with each new job.

Another person also asked about decorating for the holidays and where to start. Like I’ve mentioned before, it’s important to pick one color for your event to keep a unified look and feel. Last night, I also advised on picking a theme for your event to help give it some focus. For example, one year we used a nutcracker theme for a client’s holiday party. It was a charming take on the traditional holiday decoration and it left everyone with a new sense of fun for Christmas. And, like Nina says about any good wardrobe, having a theme makes your event “edited”--meaning that there’s a focus and specificity that helps your event’s design stand out from the rest.

Thanks again for coming out to Barnes & Noble—hopefully I’ll get to see you all again at my next talk.

Coming Up: In Conversation With Nina Garcia

Now that Thanksgiving’s over, it’s back to work work work... I actually did a special event this past weekend that I can’t talk about yet, but maybe I’ll share some info about it later this week. For now, here’s one thing that’s on my mind: next week, I’ll be having a discussion with the exquisite Nina Garcia to discuss my new book Celebrations. 

Nina is one of my favorite people in New York and when she's not taping the fabulous Project Runway, you can find her hard at work on Marie Claire.  She attended the luncheon for the launch of Celebrations about a month ago and we began a thoughtful conversation about why I wanted to create the book and the inspiration behind it. It was such a great talk that we wanted to bring the discussion public and share these thoughts with everyone—why not, right?

So, that’s exactly what we decided to do. I’ll be talking with Nina at the Barnes & Noble in the Upper East Side on December 8th at 7:00pm. If you’re in the New York City area, I hope you’ll stop by and check it out. The address of the Barnes and Noble is: 150 East 86th Street New York, NY 10028.

Within all my books, we include a picture of my incredible team. Here's the latest picture from Celebrations of everyone who created what you see in the book. As you flip through the pages, you'll get to see in more detail what we created together.

I’d also like to hear your thoughts about the book and any questions you may want us to answer during our discussion. Who knows? Nina might pick one of the questions you ask to include in her Q&A. Let me know your thoughts and questions in the comments!

A Big Thank You For Last Night

An iPhone picture from our talk

Thank you so much to everyone who came to the Learning Annex last night! I had such a great time speaking to you and meeting so many people who share my passion. I really enjoyed sharing stories about successes and failures, hearing everyone’s questions, and giving out tips and tricks for everything about our business. I hope the advice helps and I’d love to see you all again the next time I run a class.

Reminder: Learning Annex Tonight

A picture of me speaking at a past event.

Just wanted to remind everyone that I’m speaking at the Learning Annex tonight at 7:00pm. We’ll be talking about how to create one of a kind events, as well as discuss how I built up my business, my design process and how to transform spaces into something completely different. The event will take place at the Tudor Hotel: 304 East 42nd Street New York, NY 10017. To register for the class, click here.

Hope to see you tonight!

Speaking At the Learning Annex

I wanted to let everyone know that I'll be speaking at the Learning Annex next Wednesday November 4th at 7:00pm. The class is called How to Create One-of-a-Kind Events and I'll be talking about how to plan and execute your own events. We'll also talk about my design process, how to choose a theme for your event and how I built my business. My new book Celebrations will also be available for sale and I'll be signing copies.

To register for the class click here. I hope to see you all there!

A Paper Story, and A Thank You

Thanks to everyone who came out to the Learning Annex event on a rainy Tuesday night! I had a great time, and I think we had a really great discussion about this crazy business! For those of you who missed it, here are a few shots from the night:

The other big event in my week was a shoot we did here in my office for the "Paper Story". My designers and I have been playing around with paper a lot and trying to come up with new ways to use it to decorate a table. We have all seen the terrible monochromatic paper throws, but I really wanted to use it in a new way where you would never guess what it was. What do you think?

Can you believe these are all paper? The one on the left is a single sheet of paper that we folded over a chair, hole punched, and tied with ribbon. The next one is a thin paper chaircover glued together at the edges to secure it and festooned with paper cutouts. We used a flower shaped hole puncher on colored poster board. We used the thick paper because we wanted to make sure the flowers had some dimension to them. For the third one, we glued two sheets of paper together to make a chair cap. We added pom pom trim to the edges, and let the pattern of the paper do the talking. The last one is also a chair cap, this time with ruffled paper trim along the bottom edge. To make the chair caps, we took the measurements of the chair and then added a half inch to each side to make sure they fit. I really love the accessibility of paper, and also the idea that you can create something totally different with a material that is all around you. Go ahead, try it!

Amoi Magazine

Hi Everyone! Sorry I missed you last week! September has been really busy, and shows no signs of slowing down anytime soon. If you get a chance, pick up a copy of AMOI magazine (http://www.amoimag.com/magazine). It's a new Canadian magazine devoted to diversity and community building. It is published quarterly, and I have the honor of being on the cover of the fall issue! We did the shoot and the interview here in my studio, which you can get a peek at below:

I think it is a great magazine with a really interesting perspective. And I am not just saying that because I am on the cover! In the interview, I discuss some of the elements I have built my company around. I always say that the most important thing in this business is to have a product that is different. There are enough parties and events for everyone to be working, so I really don't like to get into a competitive mode at all. I would much rather set myself apart with unique elements and interesting design.
If you are in the New York area, come check out the program I'm doing with the Learning Annex. On October 9th, I will be appearing at the Metropolitan Doubletree Hotel to talk about entertaining and the events business. You can check out my calendar for more details!