Sandra Ardito heads sales, marketing and special events for KO Hospitality Management (Cooper Square Hotel, Empire Hotel, Hotel on Rivington, and Chelsea Hotel in Atlantic City). We met the hospitality connoisseur at the Cooper Square Hotel to get the scoop on the Hamptons Memorial Day hotspot, the Reform Club Inn (suites and private cottages in Amagansett), working for Ian Schrager, and why we should stay at Cooper Square (besides the fact that it’s the location of the Bjork’s afterparty tonight).

Is this the first hotel KO has developed?
No, we did the Empire Hotel on 63rd Street, and we did the Chelsea Hotel in Atlantic City for Paul Sevigny and Matt Abramcyk. For those hotels, I would describe us as the hired guns.

As regional director of nightlife for Morgans Hotel Group in Miami, Josh Wagner oversees Skybar at the Shore Club, Sunset Lounge at Mondrian, and Florida Room at the Delano. Here, he talks to us about cachaça, Grace Jones shedding tears, and growing a beard.

What are your favorite places in Miami, outside of Morgans properties?
The pool at The Standard Hotel is the most relaxing place in Miami, period. There’s an incredible place called Silvia’s. It’s this inland restaurant on the canal where nobody speaks any English, and you can pick your fish in an icebox right there, and they cook it up right on the spot for you. I love the bar at Smith & Wollensky. I like Abbey Brewing Co. because it’s a tiny bar that just has beer and a dart board, and on any night off, there’s nothing better than a pint and a game of darts.

Danny Clinch’s images of rock stars, his travels, his life, and everyday events will adorn the walls of the new W South Beach opening in May 2009. An excitable Clinch talks about these new opportunities, his style of work, and the photos he’s about to unveil at the new W.

Thompson Hotels' director of promotions and entertainment Med Abrous, on his once-in-a-lifetime guest performance with Prince, bringing movie night to clubs and the bright side of the bottle-service decline.

What’s the best night you’ve ever had at one of your venues?
A little over a year ago, I put together some concerts in the Roosevelt Ballroom for Prince. He performed six shows for about 300 people per show. It was so intimate, and he put on such an amazing show. During the third show, I’m sitting with a group of people -- the crowd was almost more famous than he was, which is really weird -- and he starts playing this riff, then calls my name and says, “Yo Med! Get up here.” So I get up onstage with Prince, and he’s playing “Play that Funky Music White Boy,” and I basically sing onstage with him playing backup guitar. It was amazing. I have a picture to prove it because it sounds like such a tall tale. I think that was pretty much the highlight of my life.

Hotelier and restaurateur Sam Nazarian -- the man behind the Philippe Starck-designed SLS brand (SLS Beverly Hills), celebrity hotspot Hyde, and future Vegas landmark, the revamped Sahara Hotel & Casino -- gives BlackBook the inside scoop on his top picks around the country, academic lecturing, and the luxury of flying private.

When you're not visiting your own bars, clubs, and restaurants, where can we find you?
I love Houston’s. It’s a very contemporary American brand. It’s not the most trendy and not the most chic, but it's one of the most successful brands, and I love going there because I know exactly what I’m going to get every time. I love Giorgio Baldi in Malibu. There is something that is so timeless in the personality of the staff, and the food is amazing. You get transported into this Italian world. It’s really a staple of our community. I like going to Tenjune in New York and Lavo in Las Vegas.

Having made a name for himself as a developer, Avi Brosh found a hole to fill in hospitality, responding with his hyper-cool West Hollywood hotel Palihouse and succeeding where none had before in making LAX-adjacent Westchester hop with his Custom Hotel. This creative spirit expands on his years of hard work, present trials and travels, and dreams for the future.

Where do you hang out?
I go to The Hall Courtyard Brasserie at Palihouse Holloway. It has the absolute best vibe and crowd in LA. I also love the street Abbot Kinney in Venice Beach, where there are several great neighborhood restaurants and bars I go to frequently. I’m in New York at least five to ten days a month, and every time I’m there I always seem to manage my way, at some point, to this gorgeous little bar in Tribeca called Smith & Mills. I love that place, but they only take cash -- which I pretty much never have on me -- so I’m always bumming drinks from whomever I’m there with.

Syndicate PR’s founder Nathan Ellis on spearheading the popularity of the Fashion Week presentation format, earning Anna Wintour's approval and looking forward to the most imaginative designer each season.

What has been your most memorable Fashion Week moment so far?
One is the 2007 Petrescu project with Trovata, where we created characters inspired by the collection and then unleashed them on an unsuspecting Fashion Week. When WWD ran an article on the stunt mid-Fashion Week because Radar.com speculated it might be an Ali G prank, I knew we had created something that would really raise eyebrows. Page Six outed us the last day of Fashion Week, and we celebrated with a party hosted by, quite naturally, the faux Romanian socialites and Waris.

Alan Philips and Josh Shames are founders of SKY Group and Deluxe Experience. Their clients include One Group (STK), Gerber Group (Whiskey Bar), Morgans Hotel Group (Hudson, Royalton, The Shore Club), Borgata Hotel, Brier Group (Highbar) ... the list goes on.

What are your favorite places in the world?
Alan Philips: Sushi of Gari. They have the freshest fish, simply and creatively prepared, in understated surroundings. I don't think that there is anywhere you can experience something as delicious and unexpected as the salmon tomato onion sushi. Bagatelle has incredible energy and music, very New York. I recently had the pleasure of staying and experiencing the newest Morgans Hotel in Miami, Mondrian Miami. Marcel Wanders has designed a spectacular hotel that captures the surprise and whimsy that you first felt when entering the Delano 20 years ago.
Josh Shames: The Box is an amazing New York experience, and I've never felt the energy from a nightclub that I have felt at Palladium in Acapulco, Mexico. 2000-plus people, with floor-to-ceiling glass walls over looking the Acapulco bay. As for restaurants, the China Club in Hong Kong or Il Latini in Florence, Italy, are the two of my favorite dining experiences. If I had a last meal, then it would be Don Pepe's in Ozone Park.

Five-time Oscar winning director, producer, writer, hotelier, pasta-company owner, publisher, restaurateur, and winemaker Francis Ford Coppola on getting wrapped up in the wine business, how Facebook is changing the industry and his new film, out in April, Tetro.

How would you describe yourself? I think of myself as an inventor of sorts, but I was trained in theater and film as a writer, director, and producer.

How did you get your start? I did my first little film with an 8mm camera when I was about ten and always wrote stories and did plays as a kid. At Hofstra, I became a drama major and was involved in all of the university theatrical productions -- first as a "tech guy" and later as the director. After graduation, I went to the UCLA film school where I completed the MFA program in film. My thesis was the feature film You're a Big Boy Now.

Vegas native and owner of the newly opened Lucky Club Hotel & Casino Seth Schorr on the future of Vegas nightclubs, early memories of Steve Wynn, and what's keeping him at home most nights.

Where do you hang out? My wife and I are homebodies these days. Growing up in Las Vegas, I spent my teenage years and early 20s frequenting every club and bar in town. But when we do get the urge to watch other people get intoxicated and listen to loud music, we visit Tryst or Blush at Wynn Las Vegas.