Tiny Reubens, Big Ideas: A Night at "The Most New York Party Ever"
The David Prize Awards its $1 Million for 2025
Thursday, October 30, 2025
Williamsburg, Brooklyn
Tonight I found myself wandering through a warehouse-turned-event-space in Domino Park, Brooklyn, home to what may be the most hopeful room in New York: The David Prize party.
If you haven’t heard of it, The David Prize is a $200,000 no-strings-attached grant given to five New Yorkers each year to support their ideas for a better city. Not start-ups. Not VC bait. Just real people doing meaningful work with no PowerPoint decks in sight. I, meanwhile, was there scoffing tiny Reuben sandwiches while watching pro chess players from the park wipe the floor with unsuspecting attendees.
I arrived underdressed, overwhelmed, and quickly overfed, nibbling pizza slices the size of a MetroCard and sipping free cocktails I couldn’t pronounce. Then, in a turn of very on-brand luck, I bumped into Cafe Anne’s
, my favourite Substacker in NYC. We talked newsletters, the grind, and which canapés looked least unstable. Moments later, I found myself next to two towering cartoon talents: Ed Steed and Millie von Platen. You know, just casually standing next to artists who’ve churned out countless cartoons, covers and illustrations for The New Yorker, NYRB, The New York Times… while I nervously wiped mustard off my shirt. The woman who is the voice of the subway announcements, Bernie Wagenblast, was our MC. (Yes, she was once a man. Quite a story!) She gave us a few familiar lines to rapturous applause.)
The room was buzzing with energy- not networking-LinkedIn energy, but something warmer. Like the entire city was being condensed into one night: ideas trading hands, a shared sense that New York is still being built, still in progress.
Looking at the winners on the wall, with organisers, healers, bridge-builders, I remembered the prize’s whole ethos: to fund the overlooked. The not-yet-famous. The people who get things done, but haven’t done it all yet. They’re not after polish, they’re after proximity. If you know someone who fits that bill, nominations are open now, and the first deadline is November 17 at 6pm: thedavidprize.org.
I left the party feeling something I hadn’t in a while: hopeful. Not because I suddenly have a vision for urban renewal (unless sketchbooks count), but because I remembered why I still live here. New York doesn’t reward complacency; it rewards compulsion. And if all I took home was inspiration and a cocktail napkin, I’m okay with that.
‘til next time
Your pal,
“New York doesn’t reward complacency; it rewards compulsion.” What a great line!!
How did I miss the tiny ruebens? I did, however enjoy the tiny milk shake and the tiny caramel apple and tiny black-and-white cookie.