Tribeca at the Marina
A Bar-Mitzvah party with an English garden theme and floating kids' island
Hanger 11 is a really great platform on which to create any imaginable scene. I arrived at the club, full of anticipation and with a heart full of longing for the Big Apple. It almost slipped my mind that the cause for celebration was a wedding. The couple, a la mode to the core, met in New York, so they wanted a wedding inspired by the city’s nightlife. For that end, the Hanger 11 club became an ultra-chic lounge for the night.
The cocktail hour and marriage service that took place outdoors, had the innocuous appearance of a seaside cocktail affair, with no clue as to what is in store. Under the round wedding canopy that looked like an angle’s halo, rings were exchanged and the traditional stamping on the glass was the cue to step into another world through a corridor that reminded me of a time-tunnel and lead right into a Manhattan loft setting.
The décor color scheme was unusual for this kind of an event – brown, smoky green and black were everywhere you looked. Scattered throughout the “loft” were nostalgic artifacts such as antique-style globes, framed family photos. The flea market rugs added a touch of humor and hit the right tone – indeed a combination that money cannot buy.
The sitting areas were an eclectic combination of furniture, bar stools, dining tables and even lounges for those who prefer to position themselves strategically in front of the dance floor and gossip about the dancers moving to New York house beats.
To complete the décor, a retro-style family photo wall was covered in the couple’s family photos in romantic frames. At first, the wall appeared to be “just” another stationary element of the décor, but at one point, some of the images began moving, revealing that the wall was also a video constellation.
Once things started heating up, the VJ tapped into the videos to create video-art projections. On a bistro style slate menu, the dishes were projected in handwriting as if written by a waitress. The food was unusual for weddings – in keeping with the theme, we savored modern, light bistro dishes.
As long as we’ve come all the way to a TriBeCa club, it would be a shame to stuff ourselves too full to dance. The climax of the evening was a surprise performance by the rap artist Subliminal which had the couple rubbing their eyes in disbelieve – all without so much as buying a ticket to New York.
