{"id":167609,"date":"2026-03-18T20:11:18","date_gmt":"2026-03-18T20:11:18","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/167609\/"},"modified":"2026-03-18T20:11:18","modified_gmt":"2026-03-18T20:11:18","slug":"from-despair-to-dancing-pat-browns-mardi-gras-tribute-to-a-lost-love-keeps-the-good-times-rolling-on-the-lower-east-side","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/167609\/","title":{"rendered":"From despair to dancing: Pat Brown\u2019s Mardi Gras tribute to a lost love keeps the good times rolling on the Lower East Side"},"content":{"rendered":"

\t\t\t\t\"Mardi\t\t\t<\/p>\n

Pat Brown (top center, with plumes) with members of \u201cPat\u2019s Party Krewe\u201d at the annual Fat Friday event at the Angel Orensanz Foundation<\/p>\n

Photo by Bob Krasner<\/p>\n

There\u2019s a good reason why the mayor of New Orleans declared the Fat Friday Foundation<\/a>\u2018s annual fundraiser \u201cNYC\u2019s most authentic Mardi Gras party\u201d back in 2016, and there\u2019s an even better reason why Pat Brown returns to it with her friends every year.<\/p>\n

Brown, a veteran of the fashion industry with a penchant for wearing fabulous costumes, has been a regular for years with the Kostume Kult in NYC and Burning Man world in the Black Rock Desert in Nevada. This Fat Friday celebration, started in 2006 by civil rights attorney Wylie Stecklow to benefit the victims of Hurricane Katrina in New Orleans, featured fabulous music (Circus Mind, Demolition Brass Band, Rev. Billy and the Stop Shopping Choir), a wonderful venue (the Angel Orensanz Foundation on the Lower East Side), great food (Corinne\u2019s Concepts in Catering) and an open invitation to wear whatever makes you happy. \u00a0<\/p>\n

Even on an ordinary day, Brown is most likely wearing something snappy. She\u2019s done everything from dressing models for Sears TV commercials to street photography for fashion merchandisers to launching her own jewelry line to teaching non-English-speaking tailors in foreign countries how to sew their products. And she worked for several years as a licensed art therapist with both children and the elderly.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Somewhere along the way, she met Steve Rifkind, a lawyer from New Jersey. They were friends at first, and as it gradually became romantic, he jumped right into the world of costumes.\n<\/p>\n

\u201cHe wasn\u2019t into it before, but when we started costuming, he just took to it,\u201d Brown said. \u201cAll I had to do was tell him the theme, and he would put something together. He really liked the monster themes.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"PatPat Brown in civilian mode, shot in the East Village at the No Nazar Cafe \"\"Pat Brown holding a centerpiece that pictures her with Steve Rifkind the year that they won the costume contest \"\"Fat Friday\u2019s Big Chief Wylie Stecklow\u2014a civil rights lawyer by day\u2014honors the press photographers who have been documenting ICE activities at 26 Federal Plaza. \u201cTheir work ensures these moments are seen, remembered, and historically documented\u201d. says Stecklow \"\"The fabulous Angel Orensanz Foundation was the perfect venue for the Fat Friday celebration. \"\"Pat Brown (R) with one of her Krewe<\/p>\n

Unlike some people who wear costumes for the chance to be someone else for a night, Brown says that she \u201cfeels like a heightened version of myself. I feel like a million bucks!\u201d\n<\/p>\n

The Fat Friday event was a no-brainer for the pair, who made it an annual date with their friends. Not surprisingly, one year, they won \u201cChristopher\u2019s Fat Friday Fashion Show & Costume Contest,\u201d created by Christopher Hardwick.<\/p>\n

\u201cPat Brown is engaging, enthusiastic and a great participant who always dresses for the occasion!\u201d says Hardwick.\n<\/p>\n

\u201cThe picture that was on the table this year was of us winning,\u201d says Brown. \u201cWe\u2019re holding some gigantic bottle or something we won. And the glow in his face is just, you know, priceless.\u201d<\/p>\n

While Rifkind\u2019s spirit was there, sadly, he was not.\n<\/p>\n

After six years of their relationship and many more years of friendship, Rifkind was one of the early victims of COVID.\n<\/p>\n

\u201cYou don\u2019t think your friends are gonna die, you know?\u201d Brown muses. \u201cYou\u2019re feeling despair. \u2026 I realized I was feeling despair. I realized that I was sending out negative energy. So I printed up all kinds of fun pictures of us, smiling, glowing, and I put them all around.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"\"L-R: Guy Smith, Rob Montenegro , Christopher Hardwick, Pat Brown \"\"Pat Brown strutting her stuff in \u201cChristopher\u2019s Fat Friday Fashion Show & Costume Contest\u201d \"\"The event benefits the New Orleans Jazz & Heritage Foundation, among other charities \"\"Fat Friday revelers dressed for excess \"\"There was no lack of sparkle at this year\u2019s Fat Friday celebration \"\"Rev. Billy and the Stop Shopping Choir revving up the crowd<\/p>\n

The Fat Friday party had shut down due to COVID, but when it reopened, Brown bought a table for her and her friends.\n<\/p>\n

\u201cIt just seemed right,\u201d she explains. \u201cIt\u2019s a little bit like Steve was there with us. I mean, I know that he\u2019s not actually there with us, but there\u2019s that way that the energy of him is there. That\u2019s the last party that we went to together, and it was an event he loved.\u00a0 He loved the colors, he loved the dress up, the music, people\u2019s creativity.\u201d<\/p>\n

And, we have to note, the friends that surrounded Brown at the most recent fete did not disappoint on any of those levels.\u00a0\n<\/p>\n

There\u2019s a tradition in New Orleans that\u2019s known as the \u201csecond line\u201d in a funeral procession. At first, the marching musicians play a somber dirge, but that gives way to joyous tunes that invite bystanders to dance and whoop it up in the streets, as the mourning of death turns into a celebration of life.<\/p>\n

In her own way, Brown has done the same, inviting friends each year to celebrate with her \u2014 New Orleans-style \u2014 as a tribute to her lost love.\u00a0\n<\/p>\n

The Fat Friday celebration benefits a number of charities, including the New Orleans Jazz & Heritage Foundation, The New York Civil Rights Project and others. More information about donating and upcoming events can be found at fatfriday.nyc<\/a>.\u00a0<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Pat Brown (top center, with plumes) with members of \u201cPat\u2019s Party Krewe\u201d at the annual Fat Friday event…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":167610,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[68762,68763,68764,68765,68766,68767,68768,68769,68770,68771,68772,68773,68774,9,16090,11,10,49,51,50,68775],"class_list":["post-167609","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-new-york","tag-burning-man-fashion","tag-celebration-of-life","tag-charity-event-lower-east-side","tag-community-and-friendship","tag-costume-party","tag-covid-loss","tag-fashion-and-costume-culture","tag-fat-friday-foundation","tag-grief-and-celebration","tag-hurricane-katrina-charity","tag-kostume-kult","tag-mardi-gras-nyc","tag-new-orleans-fundraiser","tag-new-york","tag-new-york-city-events","tag-new-york-headlines","tag-new-york-news","tag-new-york-state","tag-new-york-state-headlines","tag-new-york-state-news","tag-second-line-tradition"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/167609","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=167609"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/167609\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/167610"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=167609"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=167609"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=167609"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}