July 2006

July 31st 2006
St. Tropez via NYC

I can’t believe it’s already Monday and I haven’t even told you about my last weekend!  The festivities began with the brilliant idea to head to St. Tropez with my Florence pals Sara Roka & Ileana Turrini.  By the time I arrived the girls had already been there for a day and were still at Nikki Beach, so I headed for the bar at Hotel Sube, which is right in the center of town and despite it’s not-so-chic rooms, the bar is tres chic due to the fact that it’s the closest place to the yacht-filled port to grab a drink.  Giorgio Armani was there having drinks with friends, and soon after I arrived Sara & Ileana appeared ready for a night on the town.

From Le Sube we headed to Preston Haskell’s yacht, the “C’est La Vie” (he swears he didn’t name it), for a quick apertivo.  There I ran into PB/NYC pal Miguel Forbes, and Ileana, Sara & I ate ice cream for dinner.  From the “C’est La Vie” we all headed to Erik Wachtmeister’s hilltop villa for a fabulous bash.  Eric happens to be the CEO of a website called “Small World” (http://www.asmallworld.net/) which, as you probably know, is a bit like the myspace.com of the jet-set crowd.  As a result, his party was no small soiree, but instead a sit-down dinner for 300 people overlooking a view of the harbor of St. Tropez.  Of course, this wasn’t a crowd to just eat & run, and we all stayed dancin' in the moonlight until 3am.

One might think that 3am would be early enough to call it an evening, but instead of heading home we decided to hit Club Les Caves for one last dance-off.  At Les Caves we ran into our pals Paci & Luca from Rome, who were so deep into conversation with two beautiful Russian girls that they hardly noticed we had arrived.  We continued to dance the night away and finally headed home around 5am, leaving the boys with their newfound girlfriends.  Paci & Luca seemed to be in heaven getting so much attention from such pretty young girls, and it wasn’t until the next day we learned that soon after we left both girls told the boys that if they wanted to “hang out” any longer, it was going to cost them each 1,000 Euro.  Of course the boys felt completely dejected realizing that their ‘friends’ were actually ‘working girls’, but Sara, Ile and I thought it was fabulously funny.  Nothing’s free in St. Tropez, boys.

The next morning we all awoke surprisingly early and headed straight to Club 55 for a day at the beach.  Club 55, or “Le Cinquante-Cinq” is a private little beach club where anyone who’s anyone in St. Tropez spends the day working, very hard, on their tan.  There we ran into Giorgio Armani again, who had popped over from his yacht which was docked off the beach.  After seeing his yacht from the distance I have decided that the first thing I need to do when I get back to NYC is make HOLLYWOULD t-shirts and perfume, and sell them to everyone in sight.  Nice Boat.

After a long day of sun & swim at Le Cinquante-Cinq we all decided to head to Nikki Beach.  Have you ever been to Nikki Beach?  My Goodness.   I had always heard about it but for some reason imagined a tropical bar by the sea, like the kind of thing you find at a Holiday Inn in the Carribean.  My friends had warned me that it was “incredibly tacky” and “full of crazy people”, and that at least 50% of the swimming pool water was actually spilt champagne. 

As soon as we arrived I realized that instead of being an actual beach, Nikki Beach is a former parking lot turned “beach”, and there is no sea in sight.  What there is, however, is a swimming pool-slash-discotech, cabana “beds” that rent for 1000 Euro a day (much like our Russian friends), vats of champagne large enough to swim in (literally), and 750 of St. Tropez’s wildest party-goers – all dancing in bikinis to this summer’s cheesy St. Tropez Anthem “World, Hold On” while singing at the top of their lungs.  The drinking starts around noon and by the time we arrived at 7pm you would have thought we had landed in Ibiza.  Needless say, Nikki Beach is the most horribly fabulous place I’ve ever been, and I can't wait to go back. 

World, Hold On, and vive la St. Tropez!

July 21st 2006
Florence, Italy

July 13th 2006
Florence, Italy

Ciao ragazzi!  I’m sorry I haven’t been good at keeping up my diary, but since we last spoke I’ve been going non-stop, with a fabulous Fourth of July Clam Bake in Rhode Island, a blissful weekend in Maine, fun nights on the town in NYC, and I’m now back in Italy, who, in case you haven’t heard (over and over and over) won The World Cup.  Last night I celebrated my return to Italia by having drinks & dinner with some of Florence’s most delightful summertime dwellers including, Josh Sykes, Ileana Turrini, Vivia, Louise, and James Ferregamo, and the Beconcini’s.  Bacini!

I’m sorry to say that I have also been delinquent in documenting any of my recent escapades on film, but I’m sure the photo of the lovely Liv Tyler (right) in HOLLYWOULD will suffice.  At HOLLYWOULD we adore Liv Tyler, and we’re delighted that after all her years of loyalty she still can’t get enough of our classic ballets.  We love you Liv!  We also love our two former Customers of the Month, Grace & Jean, who look like gorgeous starlets in their HOLLYWOULDs too!

In case you hadn’t guessed, the reason I’ve come to Italy this trip is to make our Spring 2007 samples and Fall 2006 production.  We make 100% of all HOLLYWOULD shoes, handbags, and clothing just outside of Florence and I love working in Italy, but the difference in culture never ceases to amaze me.  Today, for example, I must have heard the word "eventualmente" at least 100 times.

"Eventualmente", or "eventually", is the Italian answer to every deadline under the sun.  Who needs dates, or even a calendar, when you can just schedule everything to be finished "eventualmente"?  When I first started working in Italy this unhurried mentality frustrated me to no end, and I spent months and months trying to find anyone who would sign on a dotted line to commit to a deadline.  However, "eventualmente" is not just a common term in shoe factories - it's actually used by Italians for just about everything.

The first time I ever heard the word "eventualmente" in a sentence, I was standing in line for gelato on a scorching summer day in Tuscany.  There were about 15 people in line in front of me with only one server, and more than a few crying babies, screaming kids, and people so old they looked like they might not live long enough to get their scoop.  Then, into the gelateria waltzed a teenage boy, still in his Vespa helmet, who marched to the front of the line and placed his order.  In my broken Italian I said, "Excuse me, but can't you see there's a line?" at which point the babies stopped crying, the kids stopped screaming, and everyone just stared at me in bewildered silence.  The oldest of the men finally spoke saying, "Honey, do you have some place to be?  Don't you know we'll all get our gelato... eventualmente?"  Not my favorite answer when it comes to ice cream, but he did have a point.

This weekend I’m off to the beach where, instead of worrying about shipments, I’ll be enjoying the sea & sun because at the end of the day, it will all work out… eventualmente.

July 4th 2006
New York City

Happy Birthday USA!