Springing Forward
In this week’s edition of our social column: Rachel Seville Tashjian, Kira Brunner Don, Abby Rapoport, Jake Silverstein, Andrew Marzoni, Adriane Quinlan, YuJung Kim, and more!
While the weather doesn’t quite match the ebullient mood, this was a week when social calendars filled up and people holed up by winter and the virus found themselves emerging to explore their newly unfamiliar environs and commune with others. Here is some of the stuff of life that happened these last seven days…
OUT AND ABOUT
Last Sunday, Harper’s Bazaar fashion news director Rachel Seville Tashjian celebrated her birthday with a spring luncheon at her home in south Brooklyn. “My fiancé, [Artforum senior editor] Lloyd Wise made lamb and rabbit, and I made a breakfast casserole with croissants and cheese and sausage. It’s something that you should only have once a year, but it’s my birthday, so that’s how it is,” she said. “I think everybody was very hungry, also the only things that we had to drink were martinis and champagne, so you need a little fuel for that sort of thing.” She ended up with about 30 guests who finished all of the food. “I invited about 20 of my closest friends and then I invited five or ten people who I’d only met once or twice, which I think is a very good formula for parties,” she said. “Everyone was in great form. I think people are ready to charm again. Spring is in the air, it’s officially April, the pollen is flying.”
The soundtrack consisted entirely of Maria Callas and Enya. “That was great for me personally, as the birthday girl,” said Tashjian. “Usually when I have a party, I’m mostly thinking about what other people will enjoy, because, obviously, you’re the host, but I decided to make the music only songs that I personally would enjoy with really no regard for whether or not anyone else would enjoy hearing them.” The party also included a viewing of the Grammys red carpet where Tashjian’s brother Aaron Lee Tasjan, who was nominated for Best American Roots Song, strutted in an outfit she helped style.
On Monday evening, Stranger’s Guide editor-in-chief Kira Brunner Don and publisher Abby Rapoport hosted a meet-and-greet at Bearded Lady in Prospect Heights. Among the attendees were novelist and former editor of The Paris Review Emily Nemens, Intercept deputy editor Roger Hodge, Jewish Currents newsletter editor David Klion, former New York Times opinion editor Sid Mahanta, and Wired deputy editor for features Michelle Legro.
As we reported earlier this week, the National Magazine Awards on Tuesday were an opportunity for America’s most august editors to celebrate their victories and gloat, but they were also a chance for magazine makers to catch up with each other. New York Times Magazine editor-in-chief Jake Silverstein told The Fine Print about his return to nightlife. “I took my 12-year-old to go see GZA at The Blue Note last week because he’s really suddenly into 90s rap, and it was the greatest concert,” he said. “It was the first club I’ve been to in two years and it was awesome.” Meanwhile, Harper’s publisher Rick MacArthur struggled with the sociability requirements of a social column. “Have I done anything fun in the last while? No,” he said. “I’m reading a book by Shlomo Ben-Ami about the failure of Camp David II. I wouldn’t call it fun, but it’s very useful, and there’s a lot of good gossipy things in it for such a serious book about Bill Clinton losing his temper and screaming at all the participants and Arafat.”
On Wednesday, The Fine Print hosted our first party for subscribers, sources, and friends at Greenwood Park in South Slope. Don’t worry if you missed it! We’ll be hosting our next mixer in May, probably somewhere in Manhattan.
LOVE NOTES
On Wednesday, Baffler contributor Andrew Marzoni and former Vice News Tonight supervising writer Adriane Quinlan celebrated their fifth wedding anniversary by seeing The Strokes at the Barclays Center. “Both my wife and I moved to New York in like 2007, 2008,” Marzoni said, “so while we weren’t there for the true heyday of Strokedom, our romantic notions of New York that had us end up here were at least in part due to The Strokes.” It was the first time they’d gone out without their nearly five-month-old son, who stayed home with his grandmother. “At first, it was really weird. We were walking for a few blocks and the very idea of going on a walk together without him was strange,” said Marzoni. “We were quickly able to forget about it, at least for a while.” They danced to the songs of their youth and questioned whether they were rusty dancers or the drummer couldn’t keep up with the tempo he’d set in the early days of the band. “Then once the show was dragging past 11 pm, we were looking at each other after every song like, ‘Should we go?’” Marzoni said. “I noticed my wife a couple of times looking at pictures of our son on her phone.” They stuck around for the last song of the main set but skipped the encore. Their son was asleep when they got home.
On Saturday, MSNBC anchor Nicolle Wallace married New York Times reporter Michael Schmidt, according to Page Six.
VOYAGES
On Monday, YuJung Kim, Vox Media group publisher for The Dodo and SB Nation, returned from a four-day trip to Bermuda. “It’s offseason, so we couldn’t swim in the ocean or the pool, but I love going to places offseason without any tourists where you can get a slightly better feel for the local vibes,” she told The Fine Print. “Bermuda was literally the first trip that I’ve taken as an extended family, so it was very tame.” In a few weeks, she’ll be heading off for a Napoleonic adventure to Corsica. “My husband and I vowed at some point during the pandemic to do one ‘work from a completely different place’ experience,” she said, “so we’re hoping to get work done during the three weeks we’re in Corsica.”
UPCOMING
Wednesday: At 7 pm in the library at The Malin in SoHo, Penta magazine senior editor Mitch Moxley and Bloomberg Businessweek contributor David Gauvey Herbert will host the sold-out first edition of The Night Editor, a series of storytelling, readings, and interviews. Presenters for this show include Harper’s and Vice contributor Amdé Mengistu, Vanity Fair writer May Jeong, as well as Moxley. There’ll be an after-party nearby. That same evening, at 7:30 pm, New York contributing editor Andrew Rice, whose book party inaugurated our dive into party reporting last month, will be appearing at Greenlight Bookstore on Flatbush Avenue to talk about The Year That Broke America with MSNBC political analyst Steve Kornacki. “We’ll probably go out and grab a beer afterward, if you’re into that sort of thing,” Rice wrote in an email to friends. “And I know many of you are, because I saw you at the book party last month!”
Thursday: Astra, the international literary magazine, will host its public launch event at 7 pm at McNally Jackson Seaport. Among the planned attendees are editor-in-chief Nadja Spiegelman, poetry editor Aria Aber, and contributors Leslie Jamison and Catherine Lacey.