Design After Dark

The Cat's Pajamas had a great time last Friday night at Design After Dark, the benefit for the Denver Art Museum. The food was tasty, the booze was boozy and the music was dancy. All of the architects did an amazing job creating sets based on classic films, but Cat's favorites were 4240's vignette for The Shining (they had a special carpet woven to be an exact replica of the carpet in the Stanley) and EDAW / AECOM's 2001: A Space Odyssey. Well done. Cat even hears that Wings Over the Rockies wanted to keep the Space tube as an interactive children's exhibit. Pretty cool.

Sadly, people's closets weren't nearly as interesting or creative. The dress was far less fabulous than Cat had hoped. Cat spent days shopping for her dress, even considering making one, before finally settling on a Missoni-style wrap dress and making her Tom Cat buy a new suit. And when Cat arrived and walked up the red carpet, what met her was a fair number of guests in work attire. Jeans. Suits. It was a bit disappointing. Still, there were a few beautiful dresses, and the co-chair went through four — count 'em — four costume changes. And she looked fabulous in each and every one of them.

Unfortunately, the new bane of society was also on prominent display: too short baby doll dresses. Yes, girls, they look cute from the front, but unless you have the WASP ass (i.e., none) you must take your butt into consideration. They take up room, they eat up fabric, it's just the nature of the ass. It's a bad, bad thing when a lovely girl is standing there trying to look glam in a dress that is three inches shorter in the back. Particularly when those three inches put the dress dangerously closer to her unstockinged lady parts.

Cat's favorite outfit of the evening was a prop for the Space Odyssey set. EDAW visited the super-fab Cool Hunter and got in touch with the creators of some of the most interesting things featured on the site. They in turn sent over stuff, for free, so the EDAW could use them in the silent auction. You see, everything in the sets, from the lights to the chairs, was up for bid. The best? The Selk'bag from designer Rodrigo Alonso out of Chile. It's like a mummy bag, but it has arms and hand openings and all kinds of interesting features.

Maybe we should get one for Brooke on The Real World: Denver. Maybe then she'd stop being such a whiny bitch when she has to work for Outward Bound. Nah. Nothing's gonna help that chick. Not even a super cool Selk'bag.