Hors d’oeuvres from Per Se are nice, as we learned at the Absolute magazine party Tuesday. But the skinny-minis at Glamour magazine’s party Wednesday night had better pickings: more than 2,500 appetizers, a full raw bar, and desserts (including whimsical gourmet lollipops). The crowd took over the Upper East Side restaurant David burke & donatella to celebrate Glamour’s April issue, which is devoted to heroes. The guest of honor was Meg Ryan, who photographed four of her heroes for the issue: Ann Richards, at her favorite Mexican diner in Austin; Christiane Amanpour in CNN’s newsroom; a former Tibetan prisoner, Ngawang Sangdrol, at the National Arboretum in Washington, D.C., and Queen Noor of Jordan standing in a crowd. “I wish she had more of a profile in our culture, because she’s a great interpreter of the Arab world,” Ms. Ryan told Glamour. The magazine feature also includes an interview with the actress, who became a shutterbug in high school. Of her three films in production, she said, “I can’t go into detail, but one’s funny, one’s emotional, and the other is a real acting challenge. And I’ll be in great company.”

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At the Save Venice gala at Cipriani 42nd Street, guests got into the dolce vita mood. Inspired by the name of the event, Dolce Vita a Venezia, some had watched the Fellini film for which it was named. (Dayssi Olartes de Kavanos noted that the film is constantly playing at Serafina on Broadway and 55th.)

Investment banker Claude Shaw slid into his tuxedo at home in SoHo and hopped on his mint-green Vespa for a ride uptown to pick up his date, Lara Meiland, an Upper East Sider who owns a bridal salon with her sister.

“I rode sidesaddle,” Ms. Meiland said, explaining how she managed in a long gown. “We have helmets,” Mr. Shaw added.

Yet Save Venice has a serious mission: “Flashy parties, while I enjoy them, are not the whole story,” board member Frederick Ilchman, who is an assistant curator of European paintings at the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston, e-mailed after the event.

“Venice serves an important symbolic role: It is the canary in the coal mine for Western Civilization,” Mr. Ilchman wrote. “As long as Venice survives and indeed thrives, then we are doing something right.”

Save Venice takes on large projects (restoring the stone facade of the Scula Grande di San Marco) as well as small ones (restoring the bindings of 16th-century books). One “fascinating future project,” according to Mr. Ilchman, is the scientific examination of the famous cycle of ceiling paintings by Veronese in the Church of San Sebastiano.

While Mr. Ilchman has a professional interest in the subject, laymen involved with the organization express similar passion. Junior co-chairwoman Lauren Davis, who handles press for designer J. Mendel, first visited Venice as a high school student. “The Walkman blaring Guns N’ Roses came off for the first time in months. Venice had an effect on me that I had never experienced before,” she said. After studying Venetian art history at the University of Southern California, she moved to New York and became involved with Save Venice.

Snapped: the couple who won a trip to the Grand Prix in Montreal, Daniel Ezra and Elizabeth d’a Trindade; junior co-chairwoman Tinsley Mortimer, who if off to St. Moritz this week, and real estate maven Elizabeth Stribling, a co-chairwoman of the event along with Melva Bucksbaum, Hilary Califano, George White, and Mariuccia Zerilli-Marimo.