A crowd bedecked in every shade of pink gathered at The Glasshouse in New York City yesterday evening for the Breast Cancer Research Foundation (BCRF)’s annual Hot Pink Party, raising more than $11 million—a new record for the event.
The BCRF is the largest private funder of breast cancer research worldwide, and has raised more than a billion dollars since its founding by Evelyn Lauder in 1993. The evening celebrated the immense progress made by researchers in those three-plus decades, with breast cancer death rates falling more than 40 percent. But with diagnoses increasing in young women and federal funding for science threatened, the message was clear: Private philanthropic giving to the cause has never been more important.
Jersey Mike’s founder and CEO Peter Cancro and his wife, Tatiana, received the Evelyn Lauder Spirit of Philanthropy Award, given to “a visionary individual, family, or organization whose altruistic impact profoundly improves the lives of others.” In September, Jersey Mike’s sponsored a national advertisement in support of BCRF and donated 20 percent of sales over the course of two days, raising $4.4 million. From the stage, the couple stunned BCRF President and CEO Donna McKay with the surprise gift of another $2 million. (Guests also went home with a free Italian sub from Jersey Mike’s, in the event of any post-gala munchies.)
Kate Williams, a lawyer and breast cancer survivor, was honored with the Roslyn and Leslie Goldstein Unsung Hero Award for her support of Marcella Kelson, who was diagnosed with triple negative breast cancer only four months after the birth of her second child. Williams, who had been through a similar diagnosis but never met Kelson in person, provided unwavering support by phone and text as Kelson went through 16 rounds of chemotherapies, 14 rounds of immunotherapy, 20 rounds of radiation, and a lumpectomy. Both friends are now cancer-free. “Let’s not lose sight of the fact that both of us are here to raise our kids and enjoy all this beautiful life has to offer, because of research,” Williams wrote in an Instagram post about the honor.
The night was hosted by actress and model Elizabeth Hurley, who attended with her son Damian, and also featured remarks from BCRF Scientific Director Larry Norton, M.D. and actress Toks Olagundoye. (The Frasier star shared her breast cancer story with ELLE last October.)
Other attendees included Imaan Hammam, Vera Wang, Nia Long, Misty Copeland, Katie Thurston, Gloria Estefan, and Tokyo Rose, who manned the DJ booth. ELLE editor-in-chief Nina Garcia served as a co-chair of the event.
The evening concluded with an intimate performance of songs and stories by Sting. The singer and musician spoke movingly of his mother, a nurse who died of breast cancer in 1988. “She was only 54; she wasn’t diagnosed until it was too late. At the time, there was so much fear and inexplicable sense of shame around this disease that women were paralyzed to inaction,” he said, before announcing a $250,000 BRCF endowment for research in his mother’s name. “I am so pleased, as she would be as a nurse, that something in her name would help other women avoid the tragedy that overtook her.”
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