Creator Awards!

Last night, hundreds of WeWork members and entrepreneurs gathered at the Andrew W. Mellon Auditorium on Constitution Avenue for the global launch of WeWork's Creator Awards. Here are two startup founders who have had quite a bit of success, Axios co-founders Mike Allen and Jim VandeHei, also co-founders of Politico, were special guests at the event.

WeWork handed out $1.5M in grants to 25 different small businesses at the event. The winner of the launch category and recipient of $130K, MemoryWell was started by former journalists to help caregivers better get to know Alzheimer's disease and dementia patients by chronicling the stories of each patient. Here, the company's co-founders, Andrew Fribush, Denver Nicks and Jay Newton-Small. 

Dozens of small businesses also showed off their products at booths throughout the event. Here, local DC artist Kelly Towles with his assistant, Bradley W. Johnson. 

The event had hundreds of attendees, who munched on empanadas and enjoyed the open bar before the program. Here, Vizzuality's Jocelyn West, Go Design DC's Obi Okolo and Scott Breen, who works at the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration. 

After the awards ceremony, servers brought in trays of chicken sandwiches and some attendees stayed to party until midnight. Here the U.S. State Department's Stetson Sanders and Silvia Colantonio with the head of WeLive, James Woods.