Ashly's Landmark Birthday at Jane's Carousel (2024)

It totally tracks that we met Ashly through a party. She is a premiere event planner that we've worked with for a few years and she is also behind the scenes of New York Fashion Week. For her landmark birthday on August 22nd, 2024 she reserved the iconic Jane's Carousel in Dumbo. We didn't even know you could rent it out for private events!

Upon entering the carousel area, guests were greeted with champagne flutes and guided down a red carpet where you could stop at a photo booth run by Marc Hall. As guests rounded the carousel exterior, they were dazzled with a gorgeous view of the Dumbo waterfront. Of course, guests could ride the carousel as much as they wanted all night.

Vendors

Venue: Jane's Carousel

Photographers: Eva Sakellarides & Marc Hall

Catering & Bar: Family Party Catering

Team: Jenn de la Vega, Alberto Paez, Lindsey Case, Edison Cummings, & John Peters

The Big Birthday Menu

Our menu channeled the technicolor transition from The Wizard of Oz. A dessert table of all black and white treats melted into a rainbow grazing table. The challenge of this menu was the sheer amount of items! Jane's Carousel is located outdoors at Brooklyn Bridge Park in Dumbo. We did not have running water, so everything had to be disposable or taken offsite to be cleaned. We created a makeshift kitchen under a tent and hid away behind curtains. All of our food heat had to be electrical as open flame was not allowed on site.

We wanted the menu to be a snackable graze with items you could take with you as you walked around. One of the most fun treats was rainbow caramel popcorn that we served in compostable cones.

The rainbow starts with red, the R in ROY-G-BIV. We served roasted plums with beet yogurt, radicchio cups with Calabrian chili grapefruit salad, chorizo deglazed in sherry, and fresh strawberries.

Our green section of the rainbow featured fava bean with tarragon crostini, coriander grilled zucchini skewers, and cucumber rounds topped with chive cream cheese and green tobiko we sourced from Jubilee Market.

Our black and white dessert table featured vegan rice crispy treats and double dark chocolate rice crispy treats along with cannoli, chocolate cake, white macarons (made by one of Ashly's friends, Devin), and mini black & white cookies wrapped in cellophane for guests to take home. We learned a cool trick from Big Box Vegan: the secret to vegan rice crispy treats is vegan condensed oat milk! We were able to find a few cans at our local Whole Foods.

A Party Tip

When an event is outdoors in a remote place (or in our case, a public landmark), think about the water you might need to drink, heat, or wash with. How will you handle handwashing? Pack bins and clear garbage bags for taking home dirty dishes and have a conversation with your venue about how to dispose of ice, dirty water, or bussed liquids from the bar.

Interested in collaborating on your next event? Head to our Inquiries page to tell us more.