Mid Winter Gala 2013

Trevor Traina, Vanessa Getty and Alexis Traina

After seeing Vermeer’s “Girl With A Pearl Earring,” (c. 1665) on a visit to Amsterdam in 1976, and being struck by the girl’s turbaned head and moist red lips, Yves Saint Laurent was so inspired he designed what turned out to be one of his most most important collections. That’s just one example of the influence the painting has had over three centuries on those in fashion and the visual arts.

And so it was fitting that San Francisco’s most fashionable party of the year would take place at the de Young, where the world-famous work is being displayed on the first stop of its American tour. Amazing things happen when fashion and art merge — and this year the Mid Winter Gala, hosted by the Fine Arts Museum’s Junior Committee, proved it by raising more than $400k for the museums.

Kathryn Lasater, Bo Lasater – Alexis Traina, Alison Pincus, Allison Speer

When guests arrived in the de Young Museum’s tented marquee, they walked into a winter wonderland designed by Ken Fulk, who installed a table constructed of ice dispensing vodka shots and caviar, a Dutch windmill, and a faux ice rink with four real skaters! Or as FAM Trustee Trevor Traina told Catherine Bigelow of the Chronicle, “Ten years ago we didn’t even have this museum. Or our own tablecloths. But tonight we’ve got an ice rink, a windmill and caviar.”

Trevor and Alexis Traina

Among the 380 guests brought together by Trevor Traina, Vanessa Getty, Kathryn Lasater and Allison Speer, were tech leaders Marissa Mayer and Zach Bogue, Apple’s Sir Jonathan Ive, Twitter CEO Dick Costolo,Yelp co-founder Jeremy Stoppelman, One Kings Lane co-founder Alison Pincus, Kleiner Perkins’ partner Juliet de Baubigny, actress Connie Nielsen, TV producer Lori Levine, rocker Stephan Jenkins, fashion designers Azadeh Riaz and Karen Caldwell, and Vanity Fair’s Evgenia Peretz.

The dinner in Wilsey Court, created by McCall Associates’ chef Lucas Schoemaker, was served with Perrier-Jouet champagne and Hafner Vineyards wine.