While the museums on the Mall were being readied for President Bush’s inauguration next week, the Metropolitan Museum held its own presidential inauguration Wednesday.

The event honored the museum’s incoming president, Emily Rafferty, and its outgoing president, David McKinney.

In the Great Hall, 325 guests filtered in for cocktails and hors d’oeuvres, including Peking duck pancakes and curried chicken tarts. Afterward, a dinner of lobster salad, pan-seared veal medallions, and warm chocolate molten torte was served in the Temple of Dendur. Dutch event designer Remco van Vliet cast the walls in electric blue light and laid the tables with a wintry palette of silver tablecloths, silver-rimmed glasses, and centerpieces of ice blue hydrangeas, Lambs Ear, and white tulips.

Music was as much a part of the celebration as the visual arts. For Mr. McKinney, a string quartet from the New York Philharmonic Teaching Artist Ensemble performed the Rondo from “Eine Kleine Nachtmusik” and “Some one to Watch Over Me.” For Ms. Rafferty, eight singers from the Blue Hill Troupe sang three Gilbert & Sullivan songs, including one from “The Pirates of Penzance” – with lyrics tweaked to suit the occasion.

Several remarks focused on Mr. McKinney’s Tennessee upbringing (though he has long been a resident of New Canaan, Conn.). The director of the museum, Philippe de Montebello, described Mr. McKinney’s accent as “curious.” Geography came up again in the parting words of the vice chairman of the museum, E. John Rosenwald: “God bless you both real good, as you guys say down in Tennessee.”

For Ms. Rafferty, Mr. Rosenwald presented “Rosie’s Top 12 List of serious management strategies,” gleaned from more than 50 years at Bear Stearns and read in the style of that “Grecian philosopher” David Letterman. Among the experts cited were Al Capone (“You will get further with a kind word and a gun, than you will with a kind word alone”) and Mae West (“If the world were truly rational, men would ride side-saddle”).

Mr. Rosenwald described Ms. Rafferty’s election as president as “a home run with the bases loaded.” Women guests in particular focused on the fact that Ms. Rafferty is the first female to become president at the museum.

“She’s perfectly divine. It’s a joy to see Emily in this post, along with Ellen Futter [at the Museum of Natural History] and Beverly Sills [at Lincoln Center],” said recording executive Lisa Schiff, the chairwoman of Jazz at Lincoln Center.

A touch of government came by way of a letter from Mayor Bloomberg and proclamations from Manhattan Borough President C. Virginia Fields and City Council Speaker Gifford Miller, all in honor of Mr. McKinney’s record of service. The Commissioner of Parks & Recreation, Adrien Benepe, presented both guests of honor with garb from the Central Park Conservancy shop.

Faces in the crowd included Metropolitan Museum of Art curators, such as Carlos Picon, James Watt, and Sabine Rewald; friends of Mr. McKinney’s from New Canaan, George Moore, Richard Field, and Ned Swanberg; the president of the New York Stock Exchange, Catherine Kinney, whose son, Warren, went to school with Ms. Rafferty’s son, Nick; William Rudin and his daughter Samantha, and Oscar and Annette de la Renta.

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The winner of the Ford Supermodel of the World Contest is Camila Finn, a 5 foot 9 brunette from Brazil, who now has a $250,000 contract with the agency. Ford also signed contracts with Otilia Aionesei of Romania (a blonde) and Ingrid Schram of Canada (a redhead). The announcement came Wednesday night after a catwalk extravaganza the 44 contestants had been preparing for since January 8. There’s no rest for the beautiful. The winners began work yesterday with a photo shoot for Denin with Lycra, one of the contest’s sponsors.