Emilia Wickstead Throws Jazz Age-Inspired Dinner

According to Vogue magazine, New Zealand-born fashion designer Emilia Wickstead loves New York. This was clear on a recent Tuesday night when she and Alison Loehnis of Net-a-Porter co-hosted a dinner to celebrate a new six-piece party capsule.

Everything was done in old New York fashion, from a cocktail hour that went down at Bemelmans Bar inside the Carlyle Hotel to a seated dinner at the adjacent restaurant in the Lower Gallery. Like the collection, the evening drew inspiration from the Jazz Age, as attendees were temporarily transported to a time period rooted in high glamour.

Nicky Hilton Rothschild, Jennifer Fisher, and Dree Hemingway were among those gathered around the single banquet table that was lined with bright pink bouquets and draped with a glitter-flecked fabric that mimicked one used in the collection.

Instead of a traditional menu there was a miniature booklet detailing a decadent supper of salmon rillettes, heirloom-beet carpaccio, roasted halibut, filet mignon, and a fall risotto. This was followed by pages of Wickstead’s fashion sketches, along with a snippet from a Claude McKay poem.

The finishing touch was twofold, starting with gold disc earrings at each place setting. “They’re very old-school, very Carlyle, very dress-y up-y, and very glitzy,” explained Wickstead, pictured here with Net-a-Porter’s new global buying director Elizabeth von der Goltz.

“Party dressing should feel uncomplicated,” Wickstead continued. “Whether you need to throw on a heel, a red lip, or a pair of earrings to go with it, there’s an ease in this collection – and that’s what going out and having fun should be all about.”

Original article by Maria Ward, Vogue, October 18, 2017.

Photo by Maria Ward.