This is an excerpt from PALMER Vol. 8. To read the full story, click here to purchase the issue.
In mid-March, amfAR hosted its fourth annual Palm Beach fundraiser, and it was bigger and better than its predecessors. The event took place at the most spectacular site on the whole island, some of it still a construction site—the 20-plus acres of oceanfront property belonging to hedge funder Ken Griffin. There was a live performance by Ricky Martin. Martha Stewart was honored. Bronson van Wyck designed a series of indoor-outdoor pavilions, including one just for enjoying the sights and sounds of the ocean. (They were decorated with several dozen Oriental rugs from van Wyck’s own collection.) Surrounded by huge stalks of giant bamboo, guests entered into a jungle of ferns and every kind of palm tree. Massive, eight-foot-tall chandeliers swayed in the wind from the tops of the tents. Each table was festooned with unique linens, flowers, China, and silver. It was the kind of perfectly organized chaos that looked both deliciously decadent and absolutely effortless. Very Palm Beach.
Meanwhile, a month earlier, the Palm Beach real estate broker Christian Angle held a 50th birthday party for 500 guests at his Island home. The glass tent shimmered with 22 chandeliers, reflecting off the black-and-gold color scheme and blue malachite tablecloths. There were lobster tails galore, from the start of the party to finish, as requested by the host. There were life-size ice sculptures of palm trees and underwater creatures, along with 26-foot-long wraparound sofas in blue velvet. A jazz quartet came in from Miami to open for a local band and DJ, so that the music never stopped. Even Sylvester Stallone took to the dance floor with his wife Jennifer Flavin and their daughters.
These are just two examples of the legendary, elegant, extravagant, and fun fetes that Palm Beach is known for. Or had been known for, at least. After a somewhat sleepy spell, when an aging population politely attended requisite events and went home to bed, the party is definitely back. There’s a new golden age of going out in Palm Beach. Call it a return of the ʼ90s, an ʼ80s revival, a resurgence of ʼ70s excitement—whatever it is, it’s been building for the last few years.
“Everyone in Palm Beach wants to party again,” says Bruce Sutka, a longtime event planner who helped Angle manifest his birthday vision. “It’s wild. We haven’t seen this in 15 years.”
And Sutka has seen it all. The New Year’s Eve parties he shepherded in the ʼ80s at the Flagler were notably more than over the top. There was the one that simulated a prison, with an Elvis impersonator singing “Jailhouse Rock” and a contortionist riding through the museum on a motorcycle. A James Bond party included a woman painted in gold, lying in a bathtub of 500 gold vibrators, and hit its climax with the implosion of a vacant Holiday Inn across the water. Another had a circus theme, with zebras, camels, and elephants, and trapeze swingers hanging from the ceiling. One night he lined the floors with inches of glitter. In fact, his parties could be so wild that eventually he was banned from working at the Flagler, and still is to this day.
Post-Covid, Palm Beach’s festivities restarted tentatively. First, trivia and bingo at the Colony Hotel took over Sundays and Mondays. Then, when Le Bilboquet opened, one got the sense that dancing on tables could happen or was about to, even if it didn’t really quite get there post a late-evening Vacherin.
But now, there’s no better example of the return to a bygone Palm Beach—maybe even the return of genuine, let-your-hair-down abandon—than Mary Lou’s. The speakeasy opened in January in West Palm Beach—where the late night rules are certainly more lax than on Palm Beach proper—but it has made such an immediate stamp on social life here that it already feels like an institution.
This is an excerpt from PALMER Vol. 8. To read the full story, click here to purchase the issue.