6/1/2015 Print Story
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High society: Party for the 606
May 21, 2015
A really big deal in a really unusual space: That's the bottom line for Above the Rails, the gala opening of the 606, aka the Bloomingdale Trail. Chicago's new 3mile, $95 million elevated park runs through the Logan Square and Bucktown neighborhoods.
The gala, scheduled for June 5, the day before the park's official opening, will take place at 1821 N. Ridgeway Ave. Cocktails will be served on the trail proper; the dinner, in a tent on the lawn of the McCormick Tribune YMCA nearby. Given the unusual space, the party took 18 months to plan, about six months longer than the usual fundraising event.
“No detail was too small to pay attention to,” says Beth White, Chicagoarea director of the Trust for Public Land, the nonprofit that is a partner in the project with the city of Chicago and the Chicago Park District. The gala is expected to attract as many as 700 guests; to date, it has grossed about $500,000, which will be used to finance the completion of the park.
The gala's aim: to show off the park, involve the neighborhood and be suitable for everyone from fancy people paying $500 for a ticket to neighborhood Joes and Janes ponying up $75 for an afterparty of dessert and dancing.
One of the trickier planning elements was logistics. The party location is in a lightly populated area—factories are west and south and the YMCA building is north—but still, neighbors to the east, on Lawndale Avenue, had to be considered. The gala committee plans to erect sound baffles to minimize noise. Neighbors who put up with noise and disruption during the park's construction received invitations to the party.
Another logistical hurdle: orchestrating cocktails and dinner in the space available. The VIP cocktail reception will take place on a 600footstretch of the park, but only 10 feet of the park's width. Why? The outer edges of the 14footwide park are rubbercoated running tracks, the surfaces of which could be damaged by pointy high heels. To prevent damage, velvet ropes will confine guests to the inner strip of park. The trail itself will be accessible via a ramp.
As for dinner, party planners envisioned a long, narrow table under a long, narrow tent up on the embankment. No dice: “It would look cool and neat, but it wouldn't bring a lot of people together,” says
Melanie Madigan, a planning committee member who lives four blocks north of the neighborhood. The solution: an 18,460squarefoot tent set on the lawn of the McCormick Tribune YMCA. The tent, clear on the top and sides to offer a vista of the park, will be filled with tables for four, six, eight, 10 and 12 guests, not the usual array of 10tops.
The tent cost $60,000 to rent and will be used twice—for the dinner, and then again for an opening day pancake breakfast June 6.
The gala is a neighborhood affair. All 17 members of the host committee live near the trail; most vendors involved in the party also are local. Event planner Revel Group is nearby, on Western Avenue. Chefs from area restaurants—Rick Bayless, who owns Xoco in Wicker Park, Bill Kim of Belly Shack in Bucktown and mixologist Charles Joly—are scheduled to attend and provide food and drink for the VIP cocktail party.
A final consideration: keeping the event as ecofriendly as possible. That meant scotching an idea to send a flock of lighted lanterns into the air at some point during the evening. Both possible methods—with LED lights http://www.chicagobusiness.com/article/20150521/ISSUE03/150529944?template=printart 1/2 6/1/2015 Print Story and helium balloons—proved to be ecounfriendly as well as expensive, Revel CEO Britt Whitfield says. To keep the area clean, food processing and cooking will take place at Limelight Catering's central kitchen in Lincoln Park. After the party, the site will be powerwashed and scrubbed.
As for decor and menu? That's a secret. “The essence is a supercurated experience, from the minute you step out of valet to the minute you leave,” event cochair Hanna Thomson says. “I think it's going to be unique.”
ABOVE THE RAILS GALA OPENING OF THE 606
When: 6 p.m. VIPs, 7:30 p.m. general admission, 9:30 afterparty, June 5
Where: 1821 N. Ridgeway Ave.
Dress code: Cocktail attire
How much: VIP reception, dinner and afterparty, $500 (sold out); dinner and afterparty, $350 (sold out); after party, $75 (sold out)
More info: 3127509820
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