Party in the Park

Madison Square Park Conservancy presents
PARTY IN THE PARK

Honoring
Leslie Spira Lopez, President & CEO of Kew Management
&
Daniel R. Garodnick, Chair of the City Planning Commission and
Director of the New York City Department of City Planning
Celebrating 2023 Artists Shahzia Sikander and Sheila Pepe  

Tuesday, March 28, 2023
6 PM  Cocktail Hour  
7 PM  Dinner 
Madison Square Park

Party in the Park will honor MSPC Trustee Leslie Spira Lopez, President & CEO of Kew Management, for her longtime support and dedication to the park, and Daniel R. Garodnick, Chair of the City Planning Commission and Director of the New York City Department of City Planning, for his leadership in urban planning and commitment to neighborhoods across New York City. We'll also celebrate 2023 Artists Shahzia Sikander and Sheila Pepe. Sikander's Havah...to breathe, air, life is on view through June 4 in the park and at the Courthouse of the Appellate Division, First Department of the Supreme Court of the State of New York, adjacent to the park. Pepe's My Neighbor's Garden will debut in the park in late June.

Join us for a celebratory evening under the stars, with a live and silent auction and a unique dining experience from three renowned chefs. All proceeds from the event will help sustain the Conservancy's mission to steward Madison Square Park as a clean and green oasis for our community.

Featured Chefs

Cocktail Hour
Union Square Events

First Course
Mark Strausman
Chef
Mark's Off Madison

Main Course
Michael Berardino
Chef
La Pecora Bianca

Dessert
John Doherty 
Chef Owner
BLACKBARN Restaurant

PARTY IN THE PARK EVENT COMMITTEE

HONORARY CO-CHAIRS
Commissioner Susan M. Donoghue, New York City Department of Parks & Recreation
Manhattan Borough President Mark Levine
Councilwoman Carlina Rivera, New York City Council District 2 

PARK CO-CHAIR
Leslie Spira Lopez & Mark Lopez
Kew Management

PARK BENEFACTORS
Sasha & Edward P. Bass
Michael L. Kahn
New York Life

PARK LEADERS
Bloomberg Philanthropies
BXP
Sheila Kearney Davidson
GFP Real Estate LLC
Liz & David Hirsh*
Robert T. Lapidus
Audrey & Danny Meyer
Ann & Ron Pizzuti
Porcelanosa
Related Companies
SL Green Realty Corp.
Sony Corporation of America
Sarah Stein-Sapir & Gabriel Lopez

 

PARK CHAMPIONS
ABS Partners Real Estate, LLC
CMW Strategies LLC
The Community Preservation Corporation
Crewcial Partners
Cushman & Wakefield
Erica & Anand Desai
Douglaston Development
Fried, Frank, Harris, Shriver & Jacobson LLP
George Comfort & Sons, Inc., Jamestown, L.P., and Loeb Partners Realty
Gotham Organization
Jordana & Adam Grunfeld
Audrey & Sean MacIsaac
Merchants Capital
Meridian Capital Group, LLC
One Madison Condominium
Janet Pines & Bill Lukashok
Amitha Raman & Neil Luthra
Rockrose
Paul Teti

PARK FRIENDS
Accessories Council
Anonymous
Nick Athanail & Tony Testa*
Mark Barak
Charles Bendit
David Berliner
BFC Partners
Christopher Birosak
BKSK Architects
Brooksville Company
Sarah Carter & Jude Gorman
Thomas L. Cassada / University of Rochester
Heg Chung & Ken Mak
Colliers International
Josee DeRoy
Abigail Disney & Pierre Hauser
Barbara & Bob Foley
Carol MacKinnon Fox
Gayle & Stephen Bernstein
Greenberg Traurig, LLP
Rick Gropper
Kathy Kermian-Leicht & Eric Leicht
Kingsway, Inc.
L+M Development Partners
Holly Leicht & Adam Weinstein
Sheila Lopez
Nancy Meyer & Marc Weiss
Ron Moelis
New York Community Bank a division of Flagstar Bank, N.A. Member FDIC
Dayssi Olarte de Kanavos & Paul Kanavos
Patricia Pastor & Barry Friedman
Michal Rosenn
William Rubenstein
Maryn Schiffmiller
Sean Kelly Gallery
Karl Seemer of BDO USA, LLP
Spira-Fulkerson Family
Lorelei Stein-Sapir
Sal Taibi*
TF Cornerstone
Tiffany & Co.
The Tigma Group, J.P. Morgan Advisors
Susan Turner
Lydia Vercelli of BDO USA, LLP
Samuel Weissman
Linda & Lawrence West
Linda Wisnewski*

CONTRIBUTIONS
Melissa & Dan Berger
Doris Maintenance Service
Robert & Elissa Granick
Woody Heller
Jim & Dassi Lowenstein
Christopher Parker
Cindy & David Pinter
The Sani Family Foundation
David Spira, Jeremy Spira, Heather Holden / KEW Realty Corporation
Anita & Byron Wien

Leslie Spira Lopez

Leslie Spira Lopez is President and Chief Executive Officer of Kew Management, a real estate management firm that owns and manages over one-quarter million square feet in New York City and the greater metropolitan area. A third-generation family business founded in 1953, Kew's portfolio of trophy commercial office buildings is concentrated in the NoMad neighborhood of Manhattan and also includes properties in Northern New Jersey and Suffolk County, NY. Lopez joined her family's firm in 1987 as Vice President of Leasing and Marketing after a career in computer software development. In 1995, she was named President of the New York Division and was promoted to President and CEO of Kew in 2001.

In 2008,  after buying a residence on the north end of the Park, Lopez spearheaded the effort to rebrand the neighborhood now known as NoMad in recognition of the area's prime location North of Madison Square Park. She was influential in the expansion of the former Flatiron Business Improvement District (BID) to include NoMad and its relaunch as the Flatiron NoMad Partnership, of which she is a board member. She is also the founder of the NoMad Alliance, a non-profit dedicated to promoting the neighborhood and providing resources to new businesses and residents.

Madison Square Park, the anchor of NoMad, has been a special place to Lopez since she was young. She spent treasured time there with her father as a child and later in high school when she spent her summers working for Kew. In 2007, Lopez joined the Board of Trustees of Madison Square Park Conservancy, the non-profit that raises 100% of the funds needed to operate and program Madison Square Park, and she served as the Board's Secretary for 13 years.

As a longtime NoMad resident and business owner, Lopez is continually advocating for the neighborhood - its residents, business owners, and visitors - as well as for its namesake park. Her efforts have helped NoMad become one of the most desirable and coveted neighborhoods in NYC to Live, Work and Play.

Lopez received her BA in Mathematics from the University of Rochester and an MBA from Columbia University. She resides in her beloved NoMad with her husband of 27 years and has a 22-year-old son at St. John's University.

Daniel R. Garodnick

Daniel R. Garodnick is Chair of the City Planning Commission and Director of the New York City Department of City Planning, appointed by Mayor Eric L. Adams in February 2022.

Garodnick served in the New York City Council for 12 years, representing the East Side of Manhattan, and was known as one of New York's most independent voices and effective legislators. He chaired the City Council's Planning and Economic Development Committees and served as a member of the Land Use Committee.

During his time in the City Council, Garodnick authored and passed 60 bills, including relief for small businesses from the Commercial Rent Tax, a right for tenants to sue a landlord for harassment, a biotech tax credit, transparency in the use of economic development incentives, the City's first "green" energy code, and various good government reforms.

A lawyer by training, Garodnick is perhaps best known for his skill in negotiating complicated land use matters, such as the rezoning of 80 blocks of East Midtown and the Vanderbilt Corridor. This rezoning - approved unanimously by the City Council - not only spurred new growth in a key commercial district, but it is also expected to deliver nearly a billion dollars in improvements to subways and public spaces in Midtown over the next 20 years. Garodnick also negotiated the largest affordable housing preservation deal in New York City's history - 5,000 middle-class housing units in Stuyvesant Town-Peter Cooper Village. He wrote a book on that subject, Saving Stuyvesant Town, which Amazon called one of the best nonfiction books of 2021.

Immediately before he took the helm at the City Planning Commission and the Department of City Planning, Garodnick was President and CEO of the Riverside Park Conservancy, a not-for-profit organization advocating for a six-mile park on Manhattan's. West Side.

Prior to his public service, Garodnick was a litigator at the New York law firm, Paul Weiss Rifkind Wharton & Garrison LLP. He has a B.A. from Dartmouth College and a J.D. from the University of Pennsylvania Law School, where he served as the Editor-in-Chief of the University of Pennsylvania Law Review. He lives with his wife and two sons in Manhattan.

Shahzia Sikander 
Havah...to breathe, air, life
January 17 - June 4, 2023

View More Information on Shahzia Sikander 

Sheila Pepe
My Neighbor's Garden
June 23 - December 3, 2023 

View More Information on Sheila Pepe

Madison Square Park Conservancy 

Madison Square Park Conservancy is the non-profit licensed by the City of New York to fully fund and manage the space. One-hundred percent of the funds needed to operate and program the park is met by the support of our community.

MSPC's mission is to protect, nurture, and enhance Madison Square Park, creating an environment that fosters moments of inspiration. As stewards, we strive to engage the community through our beautiful gardens, inviting amenities, and world-class programming. We believe that in an urban setting everyone deserves access to a park that allows for recreation, respite, and reflection.

To learn more about Madison Square Park, visit madisonsquarepark.org.

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