2010: The Year of the Tiger

The Chinese New Year is a celebration based upon the first day of the New moon. Just another excuse to throw an extravagant celebration!! We helped celebrate by doing the décor for the St. Regis Chinese New Year event on the 7th floor terrace. Of course, the temperatures weren’t exactly favorable, but a clear tent helped keep the guest comfortable. The tent (ironically) had a clear top so guest could actually view the "new moon" if they choose to!!

As guest entered the tent, the first element that caught their eye was the large black laquered pagoda in the rear of the tent and the lanterns that hung from the ceiling. These two dramatic elements definitely set the tone for the evening. Large reservoirs that held water with floating candles and beautiful quince blooms sat in the middle of two seating areas. The curved bar fronts were faced with two gorgeous orchid graphics and lit from behind. Four Buffets were set around the perimeter of the tent to provide authentic Chinese cuisine for the celebration.
The evening was a huge success and, once again, our talented event designer, Amy Saltzman, wowed us with her innovative and breathtaking design!! Click here to see more photos that were taken at the St. Regis by the fantastic Nancy Jo McDaniel.

Dr. Seuss Goes to War....and More!!!

We did the cutest event this weekend for the William Breman Jewish Heritage & Holocaust Museum in Midtown Atlanta. They have a new exhibit called “Dr. Seuss Goes to War….and more!” featuring some of Theodor Seuss Geisel (Dr. Seuss) original works that he did while he was the chief editorial cartoonist for the New York newspaper PM from 1941-1943.

The beginning of the exhibit (the first photo above) has more adult friendly historical facts and original material from two private collectors, together with material on loan from the Holocaust Museum in Houston. The end of the exhibit (the second photo above) has a ton of kid friendly, interactive activities that feature more of his current work. If you have kids, please take them to this interactive exhibit. I promise they will love it!!


The opening Gala featured a dramatic entrance with a large Seussian inspired arch and tuffula inspired trees in the existing planters.

Three truffla trees were at the center of the room as you entered the foyer. Our colorful painted bullseye panels were flanked by large Dr. Seuss graphics. All these elements made a dramatic tranformation to the room. Overall, the opening gala was a huge success with a little over 350 attendees.

A Labor of Love....

As Valentine’s Day is around the corner, LOVE is on our minds!! Weird, it may be, but I was thinking back on something that took a TON of love from our staff last year.

December 5, 2009, the SEC Championship was in Atlanta and we had the privilege of doing the event décor for the welcoming reception at the Georgia Aquarium. Our event designer, Sophia Lin, always comes up with new ideas and different ways to use ordinary materials. When she showed the ALE staff the picture of this gorgeous environmentally friendly chandelier, we all thought she was so innovative.

Little did Sophia know that the six 20’ chandeliers that she proposed to our client would ever touch so many people’s hands!! First, we had to gather over 8,000 2-Liter and 20 oz. plastic bottles. Then, our wood shop workers cut each of the bottles to form the flower shape!Next, two holes had to be punched in all the bottle bottoms. After A LOT of broken hole punchers, we thought of the idea of using a soldering iron to melt the holes in the bottles. Then the process of stringing began….. We strung, and we strung, and we strung until we couldn’t string anymore!!! Next, we tied the many strands of bottles onto the steel wheel and finally it was near completion!
The end result was stunning and our client was beyond ecstatic about the outcome. All of the Florida and Alabama fans had no clue that something that they enjoyed all night was built by a team of 40+ people. Till this day, we have not had anything that took as much time, effort and LOVE as those chandeliers!! Happy Valentine’s Day and we hope that you find something to put lots of LOVE into!!

A Legendary Summer...

On January 24, 2010, we were part of a bridal show at the Four Seasons Hotel in Midtown Atlanta. The Bridal show was titled “A Bride for all Seasons” and we choose to represent the summertime (so appropriate for us Atlanta natives)!!

We have all heard that the “HOT” color this season is a bright, canary yellow. One of our talented Event Designers, Amy Saltzman, created a beautiful canary toned summer wedding that she called “A Legendary Summer.” Amy took this to a new level using fresh lemons, a plethora of yellow Forsythia branches, beautiful Sunflowers and soft yellow Oncidium Orchids.

The mixture of all these yellow elements along with green moss, White Dendrobium Orchids, Hydrangea and gorgeous burch trees was the perfect combination to make you feel like you were in a summer bliss!!! For more photos taken by the lovely Nancy Jo McDaniel, enjoy this gorgeous slide show http://www.njmphotography.com.temp.livebooks.com/data/web/ALegendarySummer/index.html.

We would also like to thank Heather from Atlanta Occassions for mentioning A Legendary Event in her blog post "Inspired by this: yellow, yellow, yellow!" She commented that we acheived our summer creation with "flying YELLOW colors". Thanks for the compliments Heather!!