Saratoga Wine & Food Festival this weekend
SARATOGASPRINGS, N.Y. » When Elizabeth Sobol became the president and CEO of Saratoga Performing Arts Center last year, she told me in an interview that she had two goals. One was to find a way to make SPAC experiences more intimate and personal. The other was to increase attendance and expand the national profile of the institution.
Now, finishing her second full season, she seems to have accomplished these two goals. The move to more intimate experiences has occurred by partnering with local organizations like Caffe Lena, Saratoga Automobile Museum and local merchants and businessmen. Sobol has initiated smaller events like SPAC on Stage and Caffe Lena @ SPAC. In June, SPAC partnered with Empire State Youth Orchestra, Northeast Ballet and the Capital District Youth Chorale to offer the Festival of Young Artists.
Saratoga Wine and Food Festival, which will be held this weekend, is a great example of how partnerships can work to expand a successful event, yet at the same time make it personal and intimate. It is a huge event that covers three days, yet is so compartmentalized that the many events will seem extremely intimate and personal.
In a recent telephone interview, Sobol expressed praise for the past success of the Wine and Food Festival. “Clearly it’s been a great and popular local event. It was so good, I just felt it could somehow be elevated and become a destination event. It’s the kind of thing people should travel distances to attend.” She pauses and adds, “But that was a thought, not a plan.”
She laughed as she said in her two seasons at SPAC she has come to think of Saratoga Springs as “The City of Synchronicity.”
“It’s a place where stars align to make things happen,” she explained.
She tells of a chance encounter that helped fulfill her dream of expanding the Wine and Food Festival without making dramatic changes to an event that means so much to the organization. The Festival is, after all, the major fundraiser for SPAC’s educational programs.
Sobol remembers a casual meeting with a board member of the Saratoga Automobile Museum during the off-season. He told her about the legendary tour of Bugatti automobiles. He explained that the 80-vehicle tour only comes to the United States every ten years and has never been to New York
State. This year, for the first time ever, it was scheduled for upstate New York in September. “When I heard that, it all fell into place,” says Sobol. Arrangements were quickly made to partner with the Automobile Museum and incorporate the Bugatti tour into the Wine and Food Festival.
Sobal insists that you do not have to be a car buff to appreciate a Bugatti vehicle. “They are individual works of art,” she says. “The Bugatti family are more than designers, they are artists.” While each of the 80 cars is enormously valuable, included in the SPAC exhibit are two ultra-rare 1936 Bugatti Type 57SC Atlantics that are valued at $40-million dollars each.
To be near a car worth
$40-million dollars is a once-ina-life time experience and Sobol wanted that experience to be as memorable as possible. To be sure the guests would have close proximity to the cars, Sobol moved the event from inside the grounds of SPAC to the reflective pool. She described it as a more glamorous space that permits the guests to be nearer the cars. It also makes the Bugattis the centerpiece of the Festival.
She sounds wistful describing the scene of 80 Bugatti automobiles returning from a road excursion on Saturday to arrive, drive up the Avenue of the Pines and finish by parking and surrounding the reflection pool.
“We call it a ‘Bugatti Ballet,’” she says.
In an effort to permit the gen- eral public to have the Bugatti experience, the Wine and Food Festival will close with a Bugetti Parade. All 80 cars, including the Atlantics, will drive downtown along Broadway starting at 4:30 p.m. Saturday.
This glamour does, however, add logistical and security concerns. Again, fortune found the right person to solve those issues. Sobol says, after forming the collaboration with Saratoga Automobile Museum, she learned that the legendary event planning firm, Colin Cowie Lifestyles, was opening an office in Saratoga Springs. They made contact and immediately signed on to produce this year’s event. She says, “Colin Cowie’s input alone will raise the aesthetic bar for the entire event.”
Cowie will also add an insider’s look on the behind the scenes planning that goes on to plan such an event. On Sunday, SPAC has revived the Sunday brunch on the SPAC stage. Cohosting with Colin Cowie is internationally known Chef Todd English and Cowie will give a presentation about his “five senses” approach to event planning.
The Sunday brunch is not the only event with appeal to foodies. Of course, the Grand Tasting features gourmet food tasting. In addition, Friday night the SPAC stage will be the site for Fired Up, a BBQ competition that will have some of the area’s finest chefs compete for the title of Fired-Up Champion. Guests will be offered generous samples of the food that is cooked as well as samples of companion wines. Celebrity Chef Todd English will be the lead judge and as a special treat, Boston Red Sox legend David “Big Papi” Ortiz will attend the event. Ortiz is returning for the second year in a row and has scheduled meet and greet events throughout Friday evening.
The result of many collaborations has brought the Saratoga Wine and Food Festival national attention. However, to Elizabeth Sobal, it is still basically a local event that she describes as “an explosion of sensory experiences.”