Diner en Blanc In NYC: Inside The World's Largest Secret Dinner Party

The Team Behind Diner en Blanc

Could you give me a quick history of how your dad started this? Aymeric Pasquier: Well it started in the suburb of Paris 25 years ago with my father and his friends. He just wanted to reconnect with his friends because we went to live abroad [in Tahiti] for 2 years. When we came back, my father wanted to reconnect, make new friends and, let's say, increase his social network. So, he asked his friends to come to his garden for a picnic.

The concept was very simple, bring your friends and bring a meal to share.

Very simple, but there were so many friends that wanted to come that he needed to move it to a public park. He told everyone to dress in white just so they could recognize each other. That’s how it started. How did you bring it back? With the years, it just grew as friends were inviting other friends. Every year now, it gathers 12,000 people in Paris without a single authorization. It's not commercial because it’s free for everybody who wants to participate. When did you decided to move it outside of Paris and move? Five years ago, I organized it for the first time in Montreal. It was like a test to see if it could work outside of France. When I organized it for the first time in New York [3 years ago], we had 25,000 people on the waiting list. The welcome was very strong and now for the third edition, we gathered 4,200 people. We are very glad to be in the heart of Manhattan, and love that New Yorkers are such passionate people.