King of Parties Dies Suddenly

Robert Isabell, famous society event planner and floral designer, died this week at 57. Isabell—whom Anna Wintour called “the king of the event world”—was found dead in his Greenwich Village townhouse on Wednesday, from what his estate executor said was a heart attack. Isabell curated the biggest society events, including Caroline Kennedy’s wedding to Edwin Schlossberg on Cape Cod in 1986, Carolyn Bessette’s wedding to John F. Kennedy Jr. off the coast of Georgia in 1996, and the funeral of Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis in 1994. He is also famous for trucking four tons of glitter into Studio 54 on New Year’s Eve in the late 1970s. According to his best friend, hotelier Ian Schrager, Isabell “had a way of seeing things, looking at things, that separated him from everybody else.”