Posts from: October 2009

Brigham and Women’s Faulkner-Sagoff Centre drew inspiration from Project Runway for a juried fashion show as this year’s fund-raiser.

Brigham and Women’s Faulkner-Sagoff Breast Imaging and Diagnostic Centre combined fashion and fund raising at Runway, its first fashion show competition, held Thursday night in the InterContinental Hotel Boston’s Rose Kennedy Ballroom. With more than 400 guests, the Faulkner-Sagoff Centre exceeded its $400,000 fund-raising goal for the evening while simultaneously promoting the work of five local designers from the School of Fashion Design.

“We set out to create something completely different from anything we had ever done or seen done here in Boston,” said Anne Vanderheyden, development events associate at Faulkner Hospital, who oversaw production with Rafanelli Events. “We decided to give ourselves plenty of time to recreate our annual fund-raising event, so we spent 18 months carefully and strategically planning. As our honorary chair, Gretchen [Monahan] was fully onboard with the new idea and was able to put together a fantastic panel of judges from the fashion industry.” Runway marks the facility’s 14th fund-raising event. Previous incarnations were typically of the dinner-auction-dancing variety.

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Mass General channeled the Jungle Book at its 10th annual Storybook Ball, which this year raised $250,000 more than expected.

Massachusetts General Hospital celebrated the 10th anniversary of its Storybook Ball with a Jungle Book theme in the Westin Waterfront Grand Ballroom Saturday night. Despite a 30 percent cut in its event budget, the 400-guest gala raised $1.25 million ($250,000 more than the goal) for the emergency transport team, a service provided by MGH to pediatric patients and their families who need emergency transport from suburban hospitals.

“It is about the experience,” said Kelly Snyder, director of special Events for MGH Development. “It’s a beautiful, fun gala where guests like to lose themselves a little bit. Though we scaled back, I don’t know if our guests would notice that.”

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