Get out the long tables and the Ikebana centrepieces: Fall gala season is gearing up in Toronto and it’s going to be a busy one

As summer takes on valedictory notes, and August oozes, it is full steam ahead: Fall gala season!
And what a season it will be.
“In decades of producing galas both large and small, I have not seen such a busy social calendar like this. It is unprecedented as organizations see the need to raise funds.” This, per Barry Avrich, a long-time fixer in Toronto as well as sometime-documentarian, who also has a hand on producing many of those events via his firm BT/A.
Together with his frequent design partner, Alison Slight — of those party magicians Candice & Alison — they are up to their necks in planning. Ears, too. Some of those events, they’re working on in concert; others, separately. And a not-complete list includes the Mount Sinai 100 (with Martin Short and Michael Bublé on board for the benefit); the annual Art Bash dinner and party for the Art Gallery of Ontario (this year, a celebration of all things colour and modernism); the SOCAN awards gala; the Giller Prize gala; the annual Stratford Gala (all the world’s a stage, all right!); the Heroes Gala, c/o the charity Right to Play; the 20th anniversary edition of Grand Cru, the yearly la-di-da of wine and chefs in support of University Health Network; an anniversary dinner for L’Oreal; and the COC Centre Stage Gala for opera-hounds.
Summer? What summer? “Yes, there is a war room with meticulous details,” Avrich confirms when asked. The key: “daily meetings that review every element in the most exhaustive way to prepare for everything from the guest experience to the often A-list needs of those performing” (he once had to drive to Buffalo to get Diana Ross her fave ice cream).
Asked the way things strike them as different, events-wise, from years past, they both had lucid observations. “Guests want to be in their cars no later than 9:30 p.m., pending the event and day of the week,” Avrich believes. “Less talking heads and speeches, finding other ways to communicate the raison d’être of the evening.” Better production, too. “Quality in terms of pacing, lighting, sound. Gone are the days of overlit ballrooms and amateur tech issues and long breaks for dinner …”
Adds Slight: “From a design perspective key elements now need to be focused and not spread too thin. Think of ‘the shot’ that defines the evening and invest in it. This is what will be shared endlessly throughout the night and can vary from a high impact floral feature to a bold graphic treatment, or a supple and unexpected draping technique … guests want to engage and be consumed by the space.”
Indeed, the most salient change that’s happened on the social circuit en general, in my view, is the extent to which you’re playing not only to the people in the room, but to social media and beyond. Also: how guests themselves are documenting their experience in the way only party shutterbugs or social columnists once did. Slight agrees, but adds this: “Absolutely, but this must be strategic in order to not take away from the in-person experience.”
This goes for many other charitable shindigs in motion for the fall, including Art With Heart (a tent-pole fundraiser for Casey House) as well as the newer-school Lit Gala, celebrating Diwali (debuting last year, with a superfun dance party, it was my verdict for best freshman gala in town!).
Long tables! Having noticed a trend toward them at sit-downs lately, Slight concedes: “Most certainly the trend is shifting away from a room full of traditional rounds …” Indeed, “the event rental market has seen a flood of intriguing new table shapes with curved serpentine tables, transparent acrylic units, ceramic, stone and mirrored table tops with metallic bases … we like to mix and match, bring in soft seating lounges to bring a supper club vibe to the new age gala.”
And what is de rigueur with centrepieces? “Simple, interesting Ikebana-style centrepieces are at top of the trend,” she says. “This Japanese art, which roughly translates to ‘making flowers come alive,’ uses carefully selected blossoms, greenery and other flora to convey a specific feeling or emotion.” Her philosophy: the centrepiece should “be the lipstick on the table and a conversation-starter.”
So, then, first out of the gate: that big Mount Sinai centennial, on for mid-September — happening, in fact, at the Four Seasons Centre for the Performing Arts, right during the Toronto International Film Festival. It is one with which Avrich feels a personal connection. “My daughter was born at Sinai, so this gala will always be personal. Beyond that, participating in a project that saw a community come together to at first look after their own, and a hundred years later is a state-of-the-art health system that looks after every community, is so powerful.”
Curious about the palpable sea-change in play for those co-chairing events, and the need for the charitable set to keep repopulating itself, Avrich says: “I am encouraged that the next generation of philanthropists, whether their parents have encouraged them to do it or they feel a need to give back, is starting to take shape. I remember at the Business for the Arts Gala in 2022 where philanthropists Tim and Frances Price said they almost have mandated their children to get involved and get back.”
“There is a generation of young eager philanthropists who seem to be the driving force in the creation of new galas in support of foundations that align with their passion,” reinforces Slight. Last year, moreover, they “had the honour of producing the inaugural Rare Impact Fund Gala founded by Selena Gomez in Los Angeles and will be bringing it to life once again this October. This event brought a young and motivated crowd together in support of mental health via a non-conventional gala format …”
When all is said and gala’ed? The job for these party architects comes down to this, according to Avrich: “Constant communication with our clients and, at the same time, convincing them to push the envelope on producing a distinctive event so people want to come back the following year.”