The Financial District—where power hums beneath the pavement and history is written in ink and adrenaline—became the backdrop for a night of defiance, ambition, and elegant disruption. On Tuesday, March 4, 2025, The Wall Street Hotel hosted its third annual Women’s History Month Panel, a summit of intellect and audacity featuring some of the most formidable women in media, business, and culture.
Under the soaring ceilings of the landmark Tontine Building, a bastion of old-world commerce, the conversation cut through the noise with diamond precision. Sally Holmes, Editor-in-Chief and General Manager of InStyle, steered the discussion with the tenacity of a woman who has seen the game, rewritten the rules, and lived to tell the tale. The theme? “Women of Impact”—a phrase that in 2025 is less a title and more a declaration of war against outdated paradigms.
On stage, a power collective: Laura Jarrett (NBC News’ razor-sharp Senior Legal Correspondent), Rachelle Hruska(the brain behind Lingua Franca), Shana Stephenson (the marketing juggernaut fueling the New York Liberty), Isa Watson (Squad’s tech queen), and Samina Virk (CEO of Vestiaire Collective, the luxury resale empire). These were not women there to whisper. They spoke of revolution in real time—of gut instincts, unapologetic ambition, and the burning need to reshape the architecture of power.
THE ART OF THE PIVOT
The discussion dove deep: self-discovery in the trenches, the radical act of trusting oneself when the world demands conformity, and the absolute urgency of accessibility and inclusivity—not as buzzwords, but as the actual scaffolding of the next era of leadership.
Because let’s be clear: the old models are dead. Success is no longer a singular, narrow road paved by the same tired hands. The new definition? Instinct. Agility. An unshakable internal compass that guides one through the chaos.
A TOAST TO THE NEW ORDER
After the discussion, the night stretched on at Bar Tontine, where women who have built empires clinked glasses of Robert Mondavi wine with those who will—the next wave, the ones watching, learning, preparing to launch. The air was thick with the electricity of what’s next. Deals were struck between bites of gilded hors d’oeuvres. Friendships, alliances, and future revolutions were formed over panoramic views of Wall Street’s kingdom.
And because no movement is complete without a proper libation, The Wall Street Hotel debuted its March-exclusive cocktail menu, HERStory in a Glass—an ode to the female pioneers who shattered ceilings so the rest could soar.
THE FUTURE, REWRITTEN IN REAL TIME
In a world that still struggles with the concept of a woman being both powerful and ungovernable, nights like this are not just events—they are tectonic shifts. They provide the blueprint for a new breed of leadership, one that wears ambition like a second skin and refuses to apologize for taking up space.
The next time someone claims power has a particular look, feel, or gender—remind them of March 4, 2025, when a room full of lions rewrote the rules at The Wall Street Hotel.
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