Entertainment
Esquire Celebrates Launch of Faustina
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Chef Scott Conant latest restaurant, Faustina at the Cooper Square Hotel, has been buzzing since its soft launch early February. Tuesday marked a more formal opening celebration. Esquire and Scott Conant, who is also owner of the renown Scarpetta, hosted an event featuring numerous samples and yummy cocktails courtesy of William Grant & Sons.
A large Italian style wooden bar featured oysters with jelly , assorted charcuterie, and cheese selection while the many waiters passed dishes such as tuna and avocado salad, crispy rock shrimps, fried chicken with porcini and potato , Mediterranean octopus fingerling potatoes and olive oil and many more.
All the elements of a lovely and successful evening where brought together in the sleek new decor of Faustina, formerly Table 8.
Click here for gallery
Random Night Out: #CHEVYSXSW Road Trip Challange - #NYCHAOS Night 3
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Chevy SXSW Road Trip Challenge: Team NY
Physical Challenge:
The entire team goes and gets a pedicure. Bonus Points for each male who gets colored polish.
Have one member of the team get a temporary tattoo of your SXSW team hashtag or the Chevy bowtie.
Collection:
Bring back 5 newspapers from small towns you pass through.
Bring back 10 brochures of the most random activities and adventures you can find of things to do in the states you pass through (content must come from at least three different states).
NY Team Twitter Hashtags:
#chevysxsw
#nychaos
NY Team:
@JessicaRandazza
@SarahMcSimmons
@iamkhayyam
@Bsimi
Random Night Out: #CHEVYSXSW Road Trip Challange - #NYCHAOS DAY 3
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Chevy SXSW Road Trip Challenge: Team NY
Physical Challenge:
Aerobics Instructor: Go to a public place and start conducting an aerobics class for the team and try and get as many people as possible to join in.
Charity:
Stop at a nursing home/retirement community and run a game of bingo.
Interaction:
Interview a waiter or waitress at a truck stop/diner and ask them about their most interesting customer interaction.
NY Team Twitter Hashtags:
#chevysxsw
#nychaos
NY Team:
@JessicaRandazza
@SarahMcSimmons
@iamkhayyam
@Bsimi
Esquire Celebrates Launch of Faustina
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Tuesday, March 9th: Esquire and Faustina Cocktail Event, hosted by Esquire's David Granger- Editor in Chief and Nick Sullivan- Fashion Director.
Chef Scott Conant and Klaus Ortlieb treated guests to an exclusive cocktail party celebrating Scott’s new restaurant Faustina at The Cooper Square Hotel and toast his return to the Bowery.
Faustina:
25 Cooper Square | between 5th & 6th Streets
Random Night Out: #CHEVYSXSW Road Trip Challange - #NYCHAOS DAY 2
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#NYCHAOS Chevy Road Trip Challenge team made their way through Nashville.
Scene:
- Birthplace of Bluegrass: The team helped made the world a cleaner place by picking up litter.
- Nashville Humane Association: Gave some homeless doggies some love and play time.
- Climb Nashville: Did a little indoor rock climbing challenge and donated t-shirts to the children of Haiti
- Seanachie: Rounded out the day by gettin' their groove on at The Irish Pub.
NY Team Twitter Hashtags:
#chevysxsw
#nychaos
NY Team:
@JessicaRandazza
@SarahMcSimmons
@iamkhayyam
@Bsimi
Random Night Out: #CHEVYSXSW Road Trip Challange - #NYCHAOS DAY 1
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For certain brands, a "social media strategy" consisting of a Facebook fan page and a Twitter account is last year's model.
One of the trends you tend to see at the South by Southwest Interactive Festival (SXSWi) in Austin, Texas, is that it's where big, non-tech brands show up to test edgy social-media marketing initiatives in the ultimate geek test bed. A brand we'll be seeing a lot of at this year's SXSWi, which starts Thursday, is the General Motors-owned Chevy.
A sponsor of the festival, Chevy is going all-out with just about every variety of social media campaign imaginable: it's commissioned eight cars full of prominent bloggers and Twitter users to drive from their hometowns to Austin, naturally tweeting and TwitPic'ing their every move. (One of the members of the New York team, ubiquitous downtown party photographer Nick McGlynn, has been posting updates from the squad's Chevy Tahoe hybrid like "PANCAKE ON A STICK!")
For the SXSWi festival itself, Chevy is experimenting with some of the most buzzed-about mobile technologies: location-based networking, barcode advertising, and augmented reality. It's partnered with Austin-based geolocation app Gowalla to scatter around a variety of virtual goods, accessible by Gowalla check-ins, which can then be redeemed for free Chevy rides. It's also using quick response (QR) barcodes to provide access to mobile sites with information about vehicles (presumably these QR codes will be distributed around promotional posters and the like), and has launched an augmented reality app called "iReveal," which will "unlock three-dimensional models of Chevrolet vehicles," according to a release.
Testing this stuff out with eager SXSWi-goers is a preliminary move for Chevy, since launching a Gowalla tie-in or an augmented reality app isn't the sort of marketing campaign you can introduce to the mainstream just yet. A year or two down the road, the situation may be very different; it was a full two years between Twitter's impressive debut among the SXSWi crowd and its appearance on Oprah Winfrey's talk show, after all.
This big social-media push comes as Chevy draws closer to the launch date for the Volt, the electric sedan that some pundits say is essentially tasked with saving the beleaguered General Motors. SXSWi attendees, who are generally well-educated, early-adopter types hailing from digital industries headquartered in major cities, may not be representative of the general U.S. population. But they sure are the kinds of people who might buy electric cars.
As a tie-in, Chevy will have Volt-branded electrical charging stations around the Austin Convention Center where SXSWi attendees will be able to plug in their various mobile devices. Clever.
The New York based team is driving a Chevy Tahoe hybrid to Austin for SXSWi.
New York Team:
http://www.facebook.com/nychaos
NY Team Twitter Hashtags:
#chevysxsw
#nychaos
NY Team:
@JessicaRandazza
@SarahMcSimmons
@iamkhayyam
@Bsimi
Other Teams:
http://chevysxsw.posterous.com/
Black Eyed Peas Perform in Times Square for Samsung's 3D TV Launch
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Wednesday, March 10, 2010: The Black Eyed Peas let the beat drop in Times Square with a surprise performance for Samsung's 3D LED Television launch.
The masses gathered for a worldwide broadcast of Samsung's latest and greatest. As James Cameron remarked, "When you look back 10 years from now, you will be able to say, 'I was there. I was there in the center of the whole wide world when the future began.' Right here, tonight."
Boom-Boom Pow.
For red carpet picts, please visit: Neon Limelight
*Additional photos by Theo Wargo/Getty Images North America
KiptonART Kick-off of Armory Arts Week: Party at The Box
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March 3, 2010 - Tuesday night, KiptonART kicked off Armory Arts Week 2010 downtown-style at The Box with featured headliner Paula Valstein.
A packed house of Upper East Siders, downtown hipsters and heavy weight art patrons like; William T. Hillman, SFMoMA's David Ross, Terrence Meck, Marlborough Chelsea's Melyora Kramer, Christopher Canizares, PS1's Tim Goossens and artists David LaChapelle, Nir Hod and Izhar Patkin, filled the intimate performance club to capacity.
Upon arrival, guests witnessed warm-up performances by drag-comedian Brandon Olson and male stand-up Kim Smith.
At midnight, Paula Valstein rocketed to the stage performing four of her own songs including favorites "My My" and "Do You Know", leaving the packed house teary-eyed and screaming for more.
Born in Tel Aviv, Valstein started playing the piano at age 4 and has been obsessed with writing songs ever since. "New York was always a dream of mine, and so, one day I just bought a ticket and came," says an exuberant Valstein. This positive attitude resonates well with KiptonART who has built a cult following since 2005 and held over 40 events supporting emerging artists and musicians. "Our kick-off party for Armory Arts Week featuring Paula celebrated a milestone for our organization and deepened our commitment to raise funds through the 501©3 KiptonART Foundation founded last year," states Founder, Kipton Cronkite.
SEEN: Real Estate scion Michael Shvo, designer Rafael Cennamo, OUT's Aaron Hicklin, Elisabeth Saint-Amand, Whitewall's Michael Klug, Greg Calejo, Dalia Oberlander, Sarah Basile, Bianca Kawecki, Anastasia Rogers, Diane Pernet, Scott Buccheit and Quest's Daniel Cappello joined event hosts Patrick Duffy, Thomas Rom, Paper Mag's Peter Davis, Gregory Dufner, Affirmation Art's Marla Goldwasser, Brian Gorman, Francesca Hammerstein, Daniel Heighes Wismer, Jack Kirkland, Marcia Levine, Karline Moeller and James Salomo.
VIPs received a KiptonART Sampler CD containing three singles; featuring headliner one single by Paula Valstein, one track by 22-year-old jazz sensation, Eldar, and the third by Edwin Vazquez (who mixes a fusion of rumba, flamenco, bolero and bassanova).
To read KiptonART insider scoop on Paula Valstein, please click HERE
ELEW: Debut Album Release Celebrity Celebration
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Tuesday, March 2nd, marked the invigorating celebration of Eric Lewis' debut album release: ELEW Rockjazz Vol. 1 at Le Poisson Rouge.
The piano iconoclast, a.k.a ELEW, took the stage and quickly channelled his inner lion to roar through his fingers- sans piano bench. Celeb guests, including Gerard Butler, Ben Foster, and Robert Kennedy III, sat front and center, absorbing the massive energy and passion that exudes through Lewis and his music.
Lewis manipulates pop-charters such as tunes by Coldplay, The Killers, and Michael Jackson, with a graceful force that captivates any listener. The magnitude of Lewis' creativity even extends to incorporating sounds from the piano's strings and baseboard. ELEW's debut is a landmark project that reconfigures the traditions of ragtime, rock and pop into a thunderous new style called Rockjazz.
ELEW has gained the adoration of mainstream political, artistic, and cultural leaders including; Brooke Shields, Donna Karan, Sting, Forest Whitaker and Eric Schmidt of Google... to name drop a few... and is now ready to blow your mind.
Check out ELEW's rendition of Mr. Brightside HERE
ELEW Rockjazz Vol. 1 is now available for digital purchase at itunes or www.cdbaby.com/elew
*all photos by Nick McGlynn for Scene B Seen, llc
Thrillist and Tasting Table Kick Off Martini Week
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Last night, Thrillist and Tasting Table kicked off Martini Week with a happy hour at Madame Geneva featuring Bombay Sapphire and Grey Goose martini cocktails. What a way to begin the two-week-long promotion, during which top bars/restaurants in Manhattan offer $10 martinis from 5:30pm to 8:30pm nightly. Some of these places include: Delmonico’s, Tabla, Peacock Alley, Tao and 10 Downing, among others...
"To pick your martini destination for tonight, visit: Manhattan Martini Week.com and tell the bartender you’re there for Martini Week!"
To view more photos, please visit: Random Night Out
*photo 1 by Nick McGlynn: Allison Parris and Marisa Kim
*photo 2 by Nick McGlynn: Bartender shakin' her martini money maker
