“Exclusivity only works if there is a desire to get through the door.”
I launched “Dinner for a Few,” an intimate quarterly dinner series, to bring together voices across art, fashion, media, design and hospitality, for conversations that might not otherwise happen around a dinner table.
With this mission in mind, my guests gather around a table at Talya in Montauk for a family-style Mediterranean meal and cocktails from Doce Mezcal and Via Carota Craft Cocktails. before we settled in for a family-style dinner.
Guests include Devorah Rose, Parrish Art Museum Executive Director Dr. Mónica Ramírez-Montagut, interior designer Sasha Bikoff, gallerist Tripoli Patterson, model Grier Hammond Henchy, Velour Medical founder Dr. Michael Kennis and Doce Mezcal’s Mia Tonelli.
“A surprise appearance by Paul McCartney really gave us all something to talk about.”
The conversation centers on a contradiction I find fascinating about exclusivity: the very things that are difficult to access often become more desirable because of that distance. Yet, exclusivity only works if there is a desire to get through the door. We discuss who ultimately decides what—and who—is culturally valuable, whether access can diminish mystique and whether exclusivity can still have meaning without simply becoming exclusionary. Sasha Bikoff brings up the ever-changing luxury retail market and how even the best clients need to make appointments or face waiting in long lines. Dr. Mónica Ramírez-Montagut discusses walking the line of serving major donors vs. the community at the Parrish Art Museum. Later, Tripoli Patterson tells tales from Camp Hero, the haunted military base in Montauk (and inspiration for the TV series “Stranger Things”) and Devorah Rose and Grier Hammond Henchy fan-girled over their love of Young Blood. And a surprise appearance by Paul McCartney really gave us all something to talk about.
“Dinner for a Few” is not about recreating an existing social circle. The goal is to put people together from different worlds and give them the space to talk and share ideas, where conversation naturally moves somewhere unexpected. – ALEXANDER HANKIN
PHOTOGRAPHS BY BFA
