fashion designers

Blonde Ambition
Vogue UK, GQ, Tatler, House & Garden Living
January 2009

By Julie Earle-Levine


IVANKA Trump, daughter of America’s real estate mogul, ‘The Donald’ takes long, stork-like strides towards me, her sky-high legs in six-inch heels gliding gracefully, her mouth slightly pouty, leaving a trail of remarkably shorter assistants in her wake. After all, Trump was a model before she realized her real estate ambitions.

The 26-year-old blonde has the impressive title of Vice President of Acquisitions and Development at the Trump Organization, in New York. She regularly appears in magazines offering tips on topics including ‘How to Be Rich, Sexy and Famous,’ but this Wharton graduate takes her career very seriously.

Trump is involved in 70 plus projects in the US and offshore, that require her to jet around the world, and to oversee meetings in the boardroom and on construction sites. How is she received? “Somebody may dismiss me because I’m young, blonde or female, but that can be used to one’s advantage,” she says, gazing coolly over her very large latte. Those close to her say she is also a fierce negotiator. “Ivanka holds her own in any meeting and what you see - a beautiful young blonde - is not what you get,” says Dolly Lenz, the top broker in America.

As a child, Trump spent some weekends on construction sites with her father or grandfather, often on a dump truck and she says she loved it. Some believe she may grab the top spot if her father ever hands over the reigns of the family’s real estate empire. Ivanka has two brothers, Donald Jnr, 30, and Eric, 23, who also work for Trump. She joined Trump in 2005, after working for developer Bruce Ratner on a large, mixed use shopping centre. “I wanted to get a sense of my self-worth and what I could accomplish, with or without my last name.”

It was not until she started working for her father, her “greatest mentor” that she really dug her heels in. “He has always pushed me to think, and dream bigger and bolder.”
In an interview in her 25th floor office with soaring views of Manhattan’s skyline and surrounded by photos of her family, layouts of a new development, and a thick manila folder marked with a long ‘to do’ list, Ivanka explained how her father convinced her to come on board. “He would send me renderings of the Trump Chicago project with a note – you could be working on this. Chicago was the siren call.”

She insists she is not just the pretty face in advertisements, but is involved in evaluating deals to pre-development planning, construction, marketing, operations sales and leasing.

What is she working on these days? Other than Chicago, Ivanka is spearheading a push by Trump to manage more of their new hotels. There are more than a dozen in the pipeline that are based on a template of Trump’s Central Park West property, including Las Vegas, a 1300-room hotel opening in March and a Fort Lauderdale, Florida that will open in January 2009. Offshore, there is Toronto, Cap Cana in the Dominican Republic, the just-open Istanbul Trump Towers complex in the city’s Sisli district and Dubai, a 61-story building and units. Trump also has its first project in Europe under way, in Scotland that will include a 450 room, five-star hotel, plus 500 single family homes, holiday homes, golf villas plus a golf course. Trump says she spends time on all of these but recently has been particularly focused on opportunities in China. “I have been going to China and meeting there with the ‘Donald Trump’s’ of those areas. It is a very important market and we want to do it right.”

Which brings us to a controversial project, Trump Soho, a 46-story building that has had a construction worker death, and upset locals who don’t like skyscrapers. It is five times the height of any building around it. Trump is naturally defensive. “There is a certain tone in the city due to a number of real catastrophies that are happening on a monumental level. We are being very cautious, and expect an elevated level of commitment to safety. We are certainly not exempt.”

She believes that Trump Soho is in fact “a great example of doing it right.” It is commanding $3,000 a square foot – top dollar – in a recession hit market. Some say the Trump brand has added $1,500 a square foot value. Trump said it is because there are 360 degree views from every floor with a hotel unit, and an amazing top floor penthouse. “It is very, very cool, Rockwell design.”

At a press conference with her siblings Trump emphasized that the company has an extremely solid track record, unlike many developers with no experience who were “just doing stuff” “We are building great hotels and now we are ramping up our hotel management position in the past two years. It has to be great. We can’t have failure.”

In August, Trump said that the building was about 57 per cent sold, mainly to European and South American buyers. The remainder are Americans, who want a chic pad in the city when they visit.

The ads for Trump Soho, plus others recently including Trump Ocean Club in Panama where she spills out of a strapless black evening dress wearing her jewelry (yes she has her own brand) are Trumpish, showcasing the biggest and best of everything you can get.

“I was part of marketing effort to appeal to a younger, more hip crowd.,
says Ivanka, who does live in a Trump building, but will not live in Soho. “I’ll be spending a lot of time at the Soho property because there is a great spa and restaurant.” The building is trendy, but elegant. “Really there is nothing five star downtown. You can stay at the Mercer – it is a great hotel but you are sacrificing amenities and space. It you are staying at Trump uptown, the difference is phenomenal. The views we are offering are not typical of the area.”

Sales are strong, she said. And what of the recession that is finally affecting even luxury real estate in resilient New York? Is the luxury property boom really over? In true Trump form, Ivanka says, “The world is changing. This brings both opportunities and challenges.”

ends

Stylish Traveler - Louise Olsen, Dinosaur Designs
January/February 2009

Jewelry and home wares designer Louise Olsen is an avid traveler, splitting her time in Sydney, Tokyo and in New York, where she has an apartment. Here she reveals some of her most treasured finds for global shopping. By Julie Earle-Levine


SINCE Dinosaur Designs’ launch more than 20years ago at Sydney’s Paddington Markets, stunning, hand-sculpted resin jewelry has been turning up on chic women (and men) all over the world. DD co-founder and Sydney-based designer Louise Olsen finds inspiration for the gorgeous, often vividly colored chunky bracelets, necklaces and lust-worthy home wares, in nature and art. When she shops for herself, she resists the ordinary. “I really try to stick to the rule of only buying a few very special pieces and leaving the rest for memory. I get a lot of pleasure from objects, so those I do buy, I must absolutely love.” Here, Olsen shares her top travel discoveries.

(extra if can include: Louise travels with her husband and business partner, Stephen Ormandy, who is also a painter, and their nine-year-old daughter, Camille.

The daughter of John Olsen, the renowned Australian landscape artist, Louise comes from a family that traveled a lot, living in London, Portugal and in Sydney. DD has stores in Sydney, Melbourne, Nolita in New York and sells at 20 stores worldwide, including Tokyo Design District, Bergdorf Goodman in New York)


HOTELS
My favourite hotels are in Bali. At Bali Amandari (Kedewatan, Ubud, Bali, Indonesia; (62) 361 975 333; www.amanresorts.com/amandari) you stay in these little huts right in the rainforest. It is very dense. There are these heady, incredible flowers, lush shaped leaves and Proteas, which are so wonderful to draw, so sculptural. I’m not a big beach person. Not a sun baker. More of a quick dip, then head off the beach and get into the sketching kind of person. The hotel is on the edge of a cliff, so you look down these valleys. It is so tranquil. It is lovely to go just for a lychee cocktail, or they do a beautiful range of Balinese teas. Oberoi Seminyak Beach ( Denpaser, Bali, Indonesia, (62) 361 73 0361; www.oberoibali.com) is another hotel that is very sensitive to its environment, to the Balinese culture, tradition and beliefs. My drawing book always comes back full after these hotels. I love spending time drawing the plants, insects and the most incredible butterflies. Both hotels are designed by the Australian architect Peter Muller, who worked with Jorn Utzon on the Opera House. He’s a wonderful architect who has lived in Bali a long time. The way he uses materials, like bamboo and grasses. It is just really beautiful.

FOOD
New York. I love to go to Bar Pitti (268 Sixth Avenue; 212-982-3300) I love the buzz and the energy of it. You get a great sense of New York there. The waiters are cheeky, but fun and nice. You have to go early to get a place. The food is wonderful, simple food. The truffled pastas, using very simple olive oil with white sauce and pasta with truffle on top is so good. It’s very rich. I usually get it and share it. I love Bar Pitti for lunch or dinner. It just has great street life. One of my favourites is Cafe Gitane (242 Mott Street, Nolita, 212-334-9552) I love the Moroccan and New York feel it has. It is just down the road from the store, and the apartment, so it has become a lovely local place. Makes me feel really great as well, we love the owner, Luke, we are always talking about the street and all the things we can do. I love their orange blossom waffles. If Yoshi is on the coffee machine, you are set. In Brooklyn, we go to Lucali, (575 Henry Street, Caroll Gardens; (718) 858-4086) The man who makes the wonderful pizza is Mark, and it’s his restaurant. The store that is the restaurant used to be his favourite lolly story when he was a kid living in Brooklyn. It is just amazing. They don’t have any refrigerators there. They bring it in fresh that day. They make tomato purees by hand. There are boccocinis in big white bowls, tomato puree on the bench, the pizza man is working on a wooden table making the dough, by hand. You can see the whole process. If you come in with kids, he’ll give them some dough to play with. The menu often doesn’t stay the same. It is a matter of what produce you can get that day. The mushroom is very good. So is pepperoni. I go a lot since my friend has an apartment near there. When her son goes to sleep, he goes to his window and the ‘pizza man’ waves good night to him.

In Tokyo, I go to Tokyo Department Store, Shibuya (right on top of the train station) for the best tuna sushi bar. They just do it so well, incredible tuna. It is very, very fresh straight from fish markets. We wholesale in Tokyo so we have a long association there. We are part of store there called Idaye for lots of years, and have been in Tokyo designers block for three years. We have a real love for Tokyo and often do JAL, nine hours to Tokyo, and then stop to see friends en-route to New York. We go for at least for a week a year. I really feel at home now. It is a very exciting exhilarating city. It is very hard to give addresses. They don’t have map system like we do. Trickier, so you do need a bit of a map or you can ask the policeman in each area


SHOPPING

Tokyo. It would have to be one of the best places in the world for gifts. It has such an incredible culture of gift giving to show gratitude towards each other. It is always important to take lots of gifts with you as well! I go to Cibone (Aoyama Bell Commons B1 2-14-6 Kitaaoyama Minato-Ku, Tokyo, 107-0061; (03) 3475 8017; www.cibone.com ) a beautiful homewares/design store. It has objects from all over the world, but with a beautiful Japanese sensibility. I have bought a lot of CDs from there. They have a really great selection of jazz, plus Brazilian, Cuban music in a collection of their own. They also do beautiful collection of own, beautiful colored towels, in incredible colors, wonderful cut out circles in them, really bright turquoise, bright coral red, deep luscious colors. At Tokyo Hands (Shibuya, 12-18 Udagawa-cho, (03) 5489 5111; www.tokyu-hands.co.jp/shibuya) a Japanese hardware store, where you can find everything you need to make anything, if you need wood, rope or string, light bulbs, kitchenware, cards, stamps, glue sticks, if you are looking for anything. Really handy things, a kitchen area, wonderful tea pots and great array of tea strainers, tea stirrers, I do like tea. Sushi roll section, buy bamboo mats to buy sushi, and other tools to make sushi and a wonderful array of knick knacks. There is an exercise section where you can buy exercise tights, back massagers and special foot socks that your toes can poke out of!



At Idee Store/ Cafe (Minami-Aoyama 6-1-16-3F, (03)-3409-6744) This design store has a lot of Italian pieces and Japanese. It is now owned by Muji, and has a little café attached. I love Sfera (D-0303 9-7-4 Akasaka Minato-ku, Tokyo; (03) 5413 3083; www.ricordi-sfera.com) beautiful hand-crafted Japanese objects that are purely Japanese design. The craftsmanship is wonderful, beautiful woven baskets that are finely, delicately done and beautiful hand blown glass pieces, wooden chopping boards.


ART

I always go to Lammfromm (Yamaguchi Bldg.1F 1-1-21 Uehara Shibuya-ku Tokyo 151-0064 ; (03) 5454-0450; www.lammfromm.jp) It is a beautiful contemporary art concept store with small works by Japanese artists. My daughter Camille really loves this store. The objects are very imaginative creations. Yayoi Kusama is just one of the artists we love. We always end up coming back with one of her dot sculptures or Daisy Face’s. There is an idea that the art world is not accessible, that it is hard to have a piece, but with this store, you can buy a beautiful, inexpensive piece and really treasure it. It is really wonderful art work by Japanese artists.




Louise on Shopping

Her other favourite stores:

New York, Moss (146 Green Street, www.mossonline.com) for design; for clothes, Butter (389 Atlantic Avenue, Brooklyn);

Tokyo, Comme des Garcon – one of my favuorite stores designed by Future Systems. There is a wonderful sense of translucent space moving in and outside itself. Being its flagship store, the collection seems to be the most extensive. They have one of a kind accessories ranges you don’t see in the other stores


Loveless – eclectic collection of fashion with a funny and playful twist with a very Japanese aesthetic. I also love Tsumori Chisato, the Japanese designer, who does the most wonderful prints, also has a very unique store in Aoyama.


Ends