Who: Jacqueline Weppner of Merci New York
Where: Hudson Terrace in New York City
How many guests: 75
What time of year: October 2010
Reason: “Shaken, Not Stirred,” A Surprise (007) 30th Birthday Party for Mike Weppner

For many, including myself, James Bond is the definition of class.

His suave and sophisticated persona has made him an international icon and even Jacqueline Weppner of the wedding blog, Merci New York, couldn’t resist his charms.

Working off the “Shaken, Not Stirred” theme, Jacqueline threw a fantastic surprise party for her husband’s 30th birthday that Bond himself would be lucky to attend.

Check out this 007 celebration…

Jacqueline says:

I’ve always wanted to throw my husband a surprise 30th birthday party–something special just to celebrate him, but I wanted  to pick a theme that spoke to Mike’s interests.

One Friday evening, Mike came home with a new hobby. He declared he was going to learn to mix classic cocktails in our home and that his specialty was a “Vesper Martini” – aka the official James Bond martini named for the Bond girl Vesper Lynd.

As he began mixing up drinks in the kitchen, I found the whole thing really cute and endearing, but then a light went off in my head. I would throw him a James Bond themed surprise party playing off of the classic lines, “Shaken, Not Stirred.”

I came across some 1960s book jackets from Ian Flemming’s novels [with] illustrations of Bond Girls in different psychedelic colors.  These inspired the invitation design (by Mew Paper Arts) as well as the signature cocktail cards.

Later, we also added a Bond-girl silhouette to the chandelier via a gobo light, which moved as the music changed.  I felt it was a nice tie-in accent.

To continue with the bond girls, I had to style the venue’s cocktail waitresses!

I rented hot pink pleather 60s tent dresses from a costume supply store here in Manhattan and went on a hunt for white go-go boots in a size 8, which I finally found in the East Village.

I found some mod earrings for them and rented cigarette trays.  They all looked great as they passed out food and signature cocktails.

In terms of decor, I sourced these great red martini glasses with white dots that looked almost like dice.

I placed them on a mirror disk, filled them with water, added a floating candle, covered them with a hurricane, and added some strewn playing cards and poker chips to tie back to the Casino Royale nod occupied by the rented blackjack table and dealer.

The martini glass pieces sat on red cocktail tables across the room, married with the red banquettes, and emitted some pretty, reflected light without appearing too flashy or overdone.

I also placed white LED tealights in the wood grids surrounding the room to add some mood to the back wall.

As for the dessert bar, I played off the gray, yellow and pink palette of the invitation and spray-painted an existing cake stand I had gold.

I sourced some great sparklers and centered the table with an amazing custom designed creation from my friend Betsy of Nine Cakes.

Betsy also worked off the invitation design.  The arrangement got a dose of Bond when I placed a projection screen behind the space and had it looping vintage James Bond movies on mute.

We made sure there were a lot of Goldfinger clips on the screen so the gold colors of the dessert table had a tie in of sorts to the theme.

The cigar rollers set up shop in the other corner, (again, a very Bond like, machismo kind of thing) and I had custom cigar bands made that circled back to the invitation decor, with the event logo and “Mikes 30th Birthday Bash” in yellow typography.

I set up a blackjack table in the center of the room and as guests entered the party, the dealer gave each of them “$2,000 of chips” to begin playing.  At the end of the evening, the guests traded in chips for raffle tickets and we raffled off Bond-themed door prizes, like Tiffany playing cards, a silver cocktail shaker, a classic mixology book, and more.

The blackjack was a huge hit with friends and family alike.  My grandmother couldn’t be pulled away from it.  She was only supposed to come for an hour or two, but she spent most of the night playing away at the table and having fun with our friends, which was really great to see.

Obviously, a lot of work went into this event and after weeks of late night planning, storing supplies with our garage attendant, and sneaking around the city to find the perfect venue and coordinate the event, Mike still had no idea.

The morning of the party, I told him I had to assist an event designer friend with a brunch wedding, and I quickly snuck his tuxedo out of his closet before heading out the door to load-in.

Later, once I gave him his tux , he actually said, “Wow, I had no idea, but I did notice my tux was gone this morning.”  I chuckled, because he wears his tux twice a year  tops so for him to notice that alone was very funny to me.

The best moment of the evening was watching Mike’s face as the doors swung open and everyone yelled surprise.  After he realized the surprise was for him, and not his friend, he had this huge cheek-to-cheek grin, the same one he made right after our “first kiss” at the altar on our wedding day.

I knew that I had completely shocked and surprised him and it made me so amazingly happy to see him so elated.

Tell us about a surprise party you’ve thrown lately. Who was it for and what was the theme?

(Photos by Sofia Negron)