NEW YORK — The “meowdels” wore couture and the crowd was cat-tastic at The Algonquin Hotel’s annual feline fashion show, presided over by the historic Times Square establishment’s 12th resident cat, a ginger boy with a theatrical name, Hamlet VIII.
Thursday’s theme for the catwalk and lobby party, with some human attendees in cat-ear headbands and feline-adorned finery, was “The Purring ’20s.” That’s the era that Dorothy Parker, George S. Kaufman, Alexander Woollcott and other writers, critics, actors and all-around wits first sat around the hotel’s famed Round Table.
Hamlet VIII made his party debut this year, perched in his treehouse at the front desk, strutting for guests in a sparkly silver bow tie as about 150 human partiers munched on hors d’oeuvres and sipped wine. Their camera phones were at the ready as four-legged models were held by their owners for a red carpet walk, including a tiny cutie just a month old, a black rescue named Frank Sinatra. His bespoke ensemble included a puffy red newsboy hat.
The event is a fundraiser for the Mayor’s Alliance for NYC’s Animals, which helps support more than 150 animal shelters and rescues in New York. Organizers said more than $10,000 was expected to be raised, fueled in part by $75-a-pop ticket sales and a silent auction.