The Untermyer Gardens Conservancy presented its twelfth annual Sunset Soirée in the Walled Garden of Untermyer Gardens in Yonkers, New York. Its theme, Metamorphosis: Beauty Unbound, celebrated the ancient and mythological references in the garden, as well as the garden’s own rebirth. Once a ruin, it has reclaimed its stature as one of the finest gardens in America through the Conservancy’s efforts over the past thirteen years.
The evening honored Dr. Marsha Gordon, president of the Business Council of Westchester. The corporate co-chairs were Timothy M. Jones, CEO of Robert Martin Company, and Elizabeth Bracken-Thompson, a partner in Thompson & Bender. The benefit co-chairs were Kristen DeLaMater, Anna Carlson Gannett, and Linda Holden-Bryant. Peter Kelly and X2O provided lavish hors-d’oeuvres and cocktails. The honoree made a merry arrival in a rickshaw, accompanied by Handel’s The Arrival of the Queen of Sheba. Ken Jenkins, the Deputy County Executive, Mayor Mike Spano, and State Senate Majority Leader Andrea Stewart-Cousins were among the speakers. Guests were treated to a performance in the amphitheater by Lori Belilove & the Isadora Duncan Dance Company.
The gala’s leading corporate sponsors were Robert Martin Company, Great Point Studios, and iPark Hudson. Among the 300 attendees were Mary Calvi, Adam Rose and Peter McQuillan, Mary Smart, Joe Cotter, David Low, Barbera Brooks, Priscilla Newman, Zlata and Greg Gleason, Stephen Lash, Diane and Michael Lowry, Margie and Nate Thorne, Paolo Martino, Ann Carmel, Peter Boodell, Meg Osius, Mary Riley and Tony Smith, Judy Hart Angelo, and Jenny du Pont.
Located thirty minutes north of New York City and owned by the City of Yonkers, Untermyer Gardens was built a century ago by Samuel Untermyer, a pioneering lawyer and reformer, and designed by William Welles Bosworth, who earlier had designed Kykuit, the nearby Rockefeller estate. The Untermyer Gardens Conservancy works in partnership with the City of Yonkers to revitalize and improve the garden, which had been called the most spectacular garden in America before suffering decades of neglect. Today, it is one of the only major public gardens in the country that is free to all, with an annual audience of 200,000 visitors from all walks of life.
