Last Night with Laura Bush

Last night, real estate ditched the development deals and negotiations and put on its black-tie best as the National Building Museum held its annual Honor Award Gala. (It's like the Oscars, except it's not too long and it matters.) And former First Lady Laura Bush was among the honorees.

A trustee of the National Trust for Historic Preservation, she follows in Lady Bird Johnson's footsteps as First Ladies to win the Museum's Honor Award, which she was given for her longtime work as a historic preservation advocate. While still living in the White House, she started Preserve America, a program designed to preserve the heritage of historic communities.

We also snapped Building Museum CEO Chase Rynd with Danish ambassador Peter Taskoe-Jensen and wife Gitte. (We whipped out our Google Translate to say "Rart at møde dig," but we may have mixed up the pronunciation.) Chase tells us he was thrilled to welcome Laura and 500 other guests to the museum for the 28th edition of the Honor Award Gala.

The National Trust for Historic Preservation (and CEO Stephanie Meeks, whom we snapped with husband Rob) was also honored for its work in identifying, restoring, and saving some of America's great historic properties and landmarks. (Maybe some day they'll be preserving some of the developments you're working on now.)

Folks from all walks of real estate were on hand, including ForestCity's Jason Bonnet and Ari Blumenthal and Shalom Baranes Associates' Mark Gilliand. Mark tells us he's busy working on designs for Burnham Place at Union Station, as well as Boston Properties/Steuart Investment's 501 K St in Mount Vernon Triangle.

CoStar is a long supporter of the Building Museum (CEO Andy Florance is on the board), and we snapped CIO Frank Simuro, VP of research Dean Violagis, EVP Frank Carchedi, and CFO Brian Radecki.

Taking a break from working on Capitol Crossing: PGP's Grace Burke, Kate Mercogliano, Sarah Weaver, and Tamika Jackson.