Post-CFDA Awards, the bus was the great equalizer as revelers made their way to Central Park for the official after-party, hosted by Amazon Fashion and Coach, which kicked off at 10 p.m. As no cars are permitted in the park, all guests, no matter how starry, dutifully lined up to reach the Boathouse via shuttles. Or a Citibike, in the case of Colm Dillane of KidSuper.
Since early Monday morning, the famed restaurant had been entirely transformed to a magenta-hued party lounge, complete with plush carpets, curtains, and curved sofas, an elevated stage, and numerous photo areas with autumnal flora and fauna backdrops—much to the delight of every recognizable face from your TikTok feed. (If the room felt extra bright, it was probably due to the glow of the countless portable ring lights constantly in use.)
Those ring lights certainly sprung into action too, to catch the razzledazzle of a surprise strip tease burlesque performance by Violet Chachki. Having attended the ceremony as a guest of Coach earlier that evening, the RuPaul’s Drag Race season 7 winner caused whoots and woos as she flung her rhinestone corset into the crowd while lip-syncing along to the song Closer by EDM duo Lemaitre and ruffling her ombré feathers.
As the room began to fill with designers, including Jonathan Simkhai, Prabal Gurung, LaQuan Smith, Rebecca Minkoff, Fernando Garcia, Bach Mai, and Kate Barton, waiters did their best to offload trays of fries, but as the clock ticked closer to midnight, most attendees only had eyes for the candy table and the large crystal bowls of punch at the bar. Outside, taking a breather, eight months pregnant Cult Gaia founder Jasmin Larian was chilling out—and glowing—with her date, Taylor Hill, while a Hector handbag lying idle and unattended on a cocktail table suggested that the always-uniformed Thom Browne team must be nearby (they were!).
One person who didn’t schlep it on the bus to the bash was GloRilla; if the tell-tale SUV parked outside the entrance with the license plate LE GOAT was anything to go off. Come 11.50 p.m., it was time for DJ Kitty Ca$h to welcome the rapper to the stage. It had been a pretty wild 24 hours for the Memphis-born hitmaker. Not only had she attended her first CFDAs (avec Coach), but she also made headlines across music websites for featuring on Tyler, The Creator’s hotly-anticipated new album, which dropped on Monday, further cementing her status as a name of the moment. As she launched into her Grammy-nominated smash hit F.N.F (Let’s Go), the crowd was energetically shouting lyrics back at her, none with more gusto than a now-blonde ‘Bayou Barbie’ Angel Reese, who was almost climbing on stage herself with the excitement.