The Desserts Were Just as Photogenic as the Guests (Joan Smalls, Stella Maxwell) at Last Night’s H&M Soirée

Last night, guests ascended the stoop of a West Village townhouse; inside, its six sprawling floors were transformed into a veritable Gen Z funhouse teeming with delights. The reason for the whimsical fête? A celebration for H&M’s comparatively upmarket Studio line.

Starting on the home’s roof garden, partygoers found shaman Deborah Hanekamp who was offering crystal healings and aura readings. “New York City is, I think, where I’m most needed. It’s a transition city, so they come to see me, and then they go back to their community and share the power of being their own healer,” she told us, sitting calmly within what was once the home’s water tower, retrofitted into a quaint seating area. “This feels like a healing shell, so it’s really a dream place to work,” Hanekamp added, as her line of clients grew by the minute.

One floor below, guests were asked to join a “sensorial culinary journey” by grabbing a spoon and noshing on a dining room table piled high with confections created by Spiral Theory Test Kitchen, a trio of chefs belonging to a queer cooking collective who admitted that seeing their waggish creation unfold for the fashion set had them feeling some type of way. “This is the product of days of being too ambitious, and endlessly excited about food, and how it can make you feel, which is titillated and connected,” Bobbi Salvör Menuez told us. “And slightly... ‘in the mood!’,” co-founder Precious Okoyomon said as their third counterpart, Quori Theodor, tried to quell their laughter.

These were just a few of the “muses” selected to highlight the H&M Studio pieces, out this season. Also stationed in the entryway was Carlotta Kohl, dreaming up her signature paintings adorned with kitschy stamps. In the den was Precious Lee, offering fashion guidance from a rack of flirty frocks to pals like Rowan Blanchard and Alessandra Garcia-Lorido. “We’re doing an empowered, New York–woman moment,” Lee told Vogue. “It’s chic, but with a dose of functionality—even the sequin pieces are stretchy and don’t have that itchy lining on the inside.”

Joan Smalls, Indya Moore, and Stella Maxwell—in varied states of dress, ranging from practical daywear to vampy leather numbers—flitted throughout the maze of attractions, pausing only to indulge in a sea of flashbulbs on the grand staircase. “I feel like I’m on a treasure hunt or something,” Maxwell told Vogue just before crooner Zsela Thompson took the stage. “It’s kind of trippy, but good work H&M!”