Ian Wardropper bows: In Frick’s reopening party

Frick’s collection exploded on Monday (March 31) and showed it with $3.7 million in new funds. Since closing the renovation five years ago, the Fifth Avenue mansion has hosted its first black-tie event ahead of the agency’s long-awaited reopening on April 17, a “Welcome Back” celebration, a farewell to the outgoing director Ian Wardropperretire this year. He brought 14 years of hardship to the cavalry, including $290 million in capital activities and the museum’s temporary residency in Frick Madison.
Since the beginning of the architecture, the Art World Luminaries and patrons have participated in Art World Luminaries and patrons, the first major event held in the Gilded Age mansion, where guests are regarded as an exclusive preview of the newly accessible second-floor gallery, now open to the public for the first time in the institution’s history. Famous faces in the crowd include the Metropolitan Museum of Art and CEO Max Holleynheiress Ivy Getty,philanthropist Alice Walton and Ronald S. Lauder and Blackstone CEO Stephen Schwarzman.
After a cocktail hour, dinner was served in a first-floor gallery, with tables decorated with tailor-made floral arrangements designed to align with the art and architecture of each space. Chairman of the Board Elizabeth “Betty” Evilard The evening opens in homage to the return of Frick’s historic mansion and announces the naming of the new Ian Wardropper Education Room in honor of the outgoing director’s commitment to expanding education visits. Wardropper is to be given again, thanks to many people behind the renovation, and ends his remarks with simple remarks, with a room: “Long live the riding of the knight.” The museum’s new director, Axel Rugershow Wardropper Christofle’s commemorative silver plate.


The party flourished with a final, clever thriving: The guests of chocolate “transport crates” opened with a beautiful golden hammer to find one of nine shortbread cakes designed to look like the iconic paintings of the Flick series. If that’s not pleasant enough, attendees will extract a recently published copy of Wardropper, Fricks Collection: The Evolution of Tastes in an American Family and the Gilded Ageand a box of Ladurée Macarons.
Axel Ruger


Max Hollein and Nina Hollein


Ivy Getty


Alice Walton and Jamie Wyeth


aimee ng


Betty Evilard, David Toby and Julie Toby


Cheryl Najafi and Polly Ueberroth


Adrien Gardner Lesser, Lizzie Asher, Alexander Hankin, Francesca Vuillemin and Danielle Hankin


Betty Evilard


Marina Kellen French, Ronald S. Lauder and Jo Carole Lauder


Christine Schwarzman, Stephen Schwarzman and Lucy Schwarzman


John Najafi, Cheryl Najafi, Anjali Melwani and Prakash Melwani


Frances Beatty and Alan Adler


Dinner in the gallery

