AFTER HOURS

Apollo Circle

Carolina Herrera There are some things that just never get old. A diner breakfast at 2am. A glass of rosé on a summer evening. The movie “Clueless,” anytime, any place. Add to this list parties...


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There are some things that just never get old. A diner breakfast at 2am. A glass of rosé on a summer evening. The movie “Clueless,” anytime, any place. Add to this list parties in museums. Because really, no matter how tired you are, or how tight that borrowed dress, there is something so subversively glamorous about strutting around a dark museum in the middle of the night wearing your Sunday best. Well, Thursday evening, a grateful gaggle of young ladies and men got the chance to don their finery for the Metropolitan Museum of Art’s Apollo Circle benefit, held in collaboration with Carolina Herrera and which caters to the institution’s young membership group of 21-39 year-olds. A select few were treated to a pre-party in the Velez Blanco Patio, off the main Great Hall, which quickly filled up with a cotillion’s worth of beauties, most in Herrera dresses.

“The whole room is Herrera,” said the designer, nodding her head in approval. Champagne was sipped, canapés nibbled at and baby talk seemed to be the choice topic, particularly when Lauren Santo Doming arrived in a form-fitting gown, looking astonishingly svelte a mere three weeks after giving birth.

“I’m wearing Spanx,” she offered (as if that could make anyone feel better). The evening even brought out those who these days prefer a quiet time at home. “I never go out,” said Shoshanna Gruss, who had made an exception the night before as a chair of Society of Memorial Sloan-Kettering Cancer Center fall gala. “I only came because of Patty,” she added, referring to Patricia Lansing.

As the clock crept towards nine, the troops made their way towards the Temple of Dendur, site of the main party, whose theme was Siren’s Spell. Glowing like a warm fireplace, its bars and dancefloor comfortably packed with lithe things in black tie, it was hard not to agree with the chosen motif moniker. Though being in a museum at night does have one unexpected downfall.

“We’re standing under a small, marble penis,” said Jill Kargman as she glanced up from her red wine at the statue’s organ hovering above her. “It is cold in here, after all. There’s going to be shrinkage.”

Click here to see more photos of the party.

Photo: Sherly Rabbani & Josephine Solimene