The New York School of Interior Design is pleased to announce its annual Gala. Gala 2025 will take place on Tuesday, March 4, 2025 at a private club in Manhattan. The Gala is NYSID's largest fundraising event of the year. All proceeds will benefit the NYSID Scholarship Funds which help draw and support the most diverse, deserving, and talented students to our school and the interior design industry. NYSID is thrilled to announce the four industry professionals that will be honored for the impact and excitement of their work, forward-thinking contributions, and bold leadership in the world of design. 

The following four incredible design leaders will be honored at this year’s black-tie event:  

• Alessandra Branca, founder of Branca Inc. and Casa Branca, will receive the Albert Hadley Lifetime Achievement Award.

• Jesse Carrier and Mara Miller, founding principals of Carrier and Company Interiors, will receive the Larry Kravet Design Industry Leadership Award.  

• Beth Diana Smith ’15 (AAS), CEO and principal designer of Beth Diana Smith Interior Design, will receive the Rising Star Award, sponsored for the seventh year in a row by The Shade Store.

Awards are presented in these three categories to individuals or companies in residential or commercial design who have made significant contributions to the interior design profession.   

David Sprouls, president of NYSID said, “As a group, our 2025 honorees represent a diversity in approach—and style—that reflects contemporary interior design. They took varied paths to the field of design and run their firms differently, but both their aesthetic sensibilities and business acumen allowed them to build the thriving practices they have today. All three are truly inspirational to our students. I could not be more thrilled to celebrate their impact and honor them in a room full of their friends and colleagues.”   

This year’s gala will be co-chaired by Chesie Breen, Ingrid Edelman, Alexa Hampton, Young Huh, David Kleinberg, and Betsey Ruprecht. It is expected to bring together over 300 designers, philanthropists, and supporters. Alexa Hampton will emcee the night with her inimitable wit and energy. 

“NYSID's annual Gala raises funds for scholarships that allow talented students who couldn’t otherwise attend to matriculate and learn from the school’s award-winning faculty. Often, these very same students go on to be industry innovators like their mentors,” said Ellen Kravet, chairman of the NYSID Board of Trustees. “By joining us at the Gala you are helping us nurture and support the creativity of these students. Please join us in March to celebrate the achievements of our exceptional honorees.” 

NYSID expresses our deepest appreciation to The Shade Store for once again sponsoring The Rising Star Award. Many thanks to awards purveyor, Baccarat – the French luxury maison known for its objects of unparalleled beauty – for providing the stunning Octogone vases for our distinguished honorees. 

About this year’s honorees: 

Alessandra Branca 

Roman-born Alessandra Branca’s interiors embody her insatiable curiosity, a taste for adventure, and a dash of rebellion. Honing her craft over three decades, she has cultivated a distinctive use of vibrant layers of color and history and new artful textures all to create iconic, comfortable, chic interiors. From the millennia-old streets of Rome to the modern creative energies of her offices in Chicago, Palm Beach, and Los Angeles, Branca’s influence shapes richly classical yet updated spaces that seduce worldwide— from private residences to hotels, offices, and yachts, coast to coast and across the globe, spanning California and Colorado to New York, London, Rome and the Bahamas.  

Her early creative life was nurtured by a family that counted art historians, engineers, educators, and creatives who wove a tapestry of constant conversation, forming her foundation and feeding her imagination. Within this, context, color, texture, proportion, and precision—balanced with a quiet but strong appreciation for the ancient as well as the new—define a refined intersection of architecture, history, color and light. Her eye is as likely to be inspired by sun-soaked beach hues as by the interiors of set designer Renzo Mongiardino or the impact of the Farneses on art, architecture, and culture.  

Branca’s work has been featured in numerous magazines and design books over the years including Architectural Digest, ELLE Decor, Town & Country, W Magazine, Veranda, The New York Times, and many more. Her acclaimed book, New Classic Interiors, quickly became an industry touchstone. Her best-selling collections have been featured in a fabric line for Schumacher, wallpaper and embroidered fabrics for De Gournay, and exclusive product launch at Bergdorf Goodman. In 2020 she introduced and launched her namesake fabric, wallpaper and furniture collection Casa Branca with a boutique in Palm Beach, an Atelier and Showroom in West Palm Beach and showrooms throughout the US and UK. 

Jesse Carrier and Mara Miller 

Jesse Carrier and Mara Miller, the founding principals of Carrier and Company Interiors, are a husband-and-wife interior design duo who create rooms that offer a confident mix of timeless and contemporary design – both familiar and fresh at once. Their guiding philosophy connects client with place in a manner that reflects the distinct and singular nature of both. From bohemian glamour to country charm, from modern luxe to the timeless and ineffable, from the historically informed to the tailored and refined, the Carriers delight in adapting their impassioned sensibility to the unique elements each project presents.  

Their latest monograph, Defining Chic: Carrier and Company Interiors (Rizzoli), showcases homes that express their clients’ personalities and dreams, through the practical filters of lifestyle and location while revealing the design principles behind them. The range of projects includes a historic, art-filled New York duplex replete with period vestiges, an updated Mediterranean-style Southern California house with an art deco-era core, to a refreshed Connecticut lakeside retreat with glass expanses designed to capture stunning views. Discrete touches revealed throughout the body of work highlight the overall Carrier effect. This book will appeal to design fans of chic, livable spaces. 

The Carriers have been sought out by leading furnishing manufacturers to bring their unique vision of home and interiors to a wider audience. Carrier and Company Collections can be found at: Century Furniture (upholstery and case goods); Visual Comfort (decorative lighting); Lee Jofa, (fabric and wallpaper); Loloi (area rugs); and Soicher Marin (custom framed art). These partnerships showcase the Carriers’ talent for bucking trends while staying current and combining elegance with livability.  

Named to the prestigious Architectural Digest AD100 and Elle Decor A-List, the Carriers have garnered accolades from the world’s most prominent publications, including Architectural Digest, Vogue, Town & Country, Elle Decor, House Beautiful, Veranda, Luxe Interiors + Design, Milieu, and World of Interiors.  

Jesse and Mara met at The Fashion Institute of Technology and worked for a number of AD100 interior design firms before establishing Carrier and Company Interiors in 2005. They live in New York City and the Hudson Valley with their two children.  

 Beth Diana Smith 

Beth Diana Smith is the CEO and Principal Designer of Beth Diana Smith Interior Design, a full-service interior design firm focused on the discerning client who wants a curated home with thoughtful details. She prides herself on her bold, eclectic style while creating a home’s story through renovation, curated pieces, and customized design. Her goal for each client is to have them see another realm of possibility in how they can live.  

After Beth spent more than a decade in corporate accounting and finance in companies such as Johnson & Johnson and Viacom, she decided to pursue interior design full time including obtaining a degree from the New York School of Interior Design. However, Beth brought along a distinct set of skills such as budget management, presentation creation based on client needs, and the ability to adapt quickly. These skills allowed her to manage the client’s budget, the operations of her business, and project manage on top of the design skills and creativity required for each project. 

Beth has been on NBC and HGTV, and featured in several media outlets including House Beautiful, Elle Decor, Real Simple, The Washington Post, the Business of Home, and the Wall Street Journal. She is proudly a Founding Member of the Black Artists + Designers Guild, an Associate of the American Society of Interior Designers, a member of the Design Leadership Council, and a member of the Black Interior Designers Network.  

Previous Gala honorees include preeminent designers Anne Pyne/McMillen Inc., Nate Berkus, Erick Espinoza, Suzanne Tucker, John Edelman, Peti Lau, Jamie Drake, Young Huh, Laura Hodges, Alex Papachristidis, Corey Damen Jenkins, Nina Farmer, Jeffrey Bilhuber, Geoffrey Bradfield, Ellie Cullman, David Kleinberg, Suzanne Rheinstein, Christopher Spitzmiller, and Bunny Williams.