A&E 50 THINGS WE LOVE

Party of the year

The annual Laugh With the Library event is always one of Delray’s best parties, but this year it outdid itself at the private home of Angelo and Mari Bianco in Lake Ida. There were, it seemed, miles of shaded lawns, elegant food stations, a pool area to die for with a massive outdoor bar, a tented stage area and quite literally, everyone you know looking very Town & Country

The comedian is always hilarious, even if he isn’t, and the crowd is welcoming. This year, the Library snagged James Austin Johnson of “SNL,” who won the hearts of all its guests. Again.

Opening you did not want to miss

It doesn’t hurt that Le Colonial is drop-dead gorgeous, with white linen and exotic inlaid tile and a vintage tropical quality we should have co-opted years ago. A little Casablanca, a little Havana, a little Old Saigon with great lighting and handsome patios, it’s a formidably elegant restaurant, and the opening cocktail party orchestrated by the Buzz Agency was big. Very big. Again, it was one of those nights that everyone was there, and looking glam, and reveling in the romance and sophistication of what is a Delray first. Magnifique.

Concert

Max Weinberg is the drummer who never sleeps. On Feb. 7, the Delray Beach resident and former member of the city’s planning and zoning board was once again behind the kit for Bruce Springsteen & the E Street Band’s tour appearance at Hard Rock Live, backing the Boss on a 28-song marathon. The following night, Weinberg, not Bruce, took center stage at the Old School Square Pavilion, tearing through another 24 songs, all curated from audience requests, as part of his Max Weinberg’s Jukebox side project. The packed audience danced and grooved and sang along to decades of hits, from “A Hard Day’s Night” to “Highway to Hell” to “Cinnamon Girl” to Bruce’s own “Pink Cadillac.”

Museum hit

In December, the Cornell Art Museum, under the auspices of the Downtown Development Authority, opened for the first time since the city parted ways with Old School Square Center for the Arts in 2021. Showcasing boards and other memorabilia from the Surfing Florida Museum, the grand reopening exhibition was accompanied by little fanfare, and made more of a ripple than a splash. Well curated and aesthetically attractive, the exhibit didn’t have the cutting-edge cachet the museum had been cultivating for some 10 years prior. But its spring exhibition (on view through June 25), “The World of Water,” whose artists explore issues of conservation and sustainability, already harkens to the venue’s creative glory days.

Downtown event we still love

Having put year number 14 in the books in March, the annual Savor the Avenue produced by the DDA (from an idea submitted to them initially by Boca and Delray magazines) is now a city culinary legend. The sold-out event attracts more than 1,000 guests every year who dine al fresco on the longest dining table in Florida, stretching five bocks down the center of Atlantic Avenue, from Swinton to U.S. 1. Tables are decorated to the nines, and there is music and tinkling glasses and party lights in a communal dining experience that is both elegant and imaginative. People meet new friends, dine on exquisite four-course dinners paired with wine from participating local restaurants (where they have reserved their seats) and enjoy the distinct feeling that they may be in Europe, after all. This Delray favorite captures the magic of the city like no other—and now has a life of its own.

Art exhibition

The color pink is rife with contradictions: It has symbolized the feminist and anti-feminist, and its pale, neon and candy-coated variants conjure everything from flamingos and spoonbills to antacid medication.

Many of these associations were present in Arts Warehouse’s wide-ranging exhibition “Pink,” a group show featuring the title color in its myriad permutations. Politics and social commentary undergirded many of the pieces in “Pink,” including a number of show-stopping, room-sized installations. But the exhibition’s most frequent denominator was humor: Seldom do we laugh out loud in an art gallery, but here we could count these instances on more than one hand.