Social Diary 8/18/05 - Introducing Ivana Trump Las Vegas

Lovely summer days in Manhattan, cooler weather after the rainstorms on Sunday night

Lower Manhattan from the Brooklyn Bridge. Photo: JH.

Tuesday night, the tables down at Swifty’s were packed as if nobody’d left town: Wilbur and Hilary Geary Ross, another Hilary Califano with husband Joe entertaining; Liz Finkle and Jonathan Elliot; Mark Gilbertson holding forth with Mary van Pelt, Bruce Addison, Bill Manger, Lise Arliss; Linda and Mort Janklow with the Leslie Gelbs; Todd Meister with Serena Boardman (it was just a year ago on this day that Todd married Nicky Hilton for a quickie marriage in Las Vegas); Barbara and Bobby Liberman hosting Craig Lenard, Muffie and Don Miller entertaining author Ted Bell and party; Sassy Johnson Connor, Charlie Scheips, Linda Silverman all at separate tables. We had the Swifty’s prix fixe summer special, such a bargain: soup or salad (we had the cold Sengalese soup), Fried chicken with potato salad and corn and dessert, all for the grand total of $25!

Ivana Trump

Last night Ivana Trump hosted and cocktail party and dinner at the private club Fizz (on 55th and Lexington) to introduce to the world her latest project: Ivana Trump Las Vegas – an 80 level luxury super tower housing 943 condos — the largest, tallest residential tower West of the Mississippi. Pricing of the units begin at $550,000, with the penthouse priced at $35 million — the highest priced penthouse in the West.

They opened their sales office in Vegas two days ago, and have already sold $550 million worth of condos. And like the song says, they’ve only just begun.

Ivana will personaly design the interiors for each of the 11 types of units – each unique in size and layout and each named after one of her favorite yachting destinations such as St. Tropez, Positano, Capri, Monaco, Amalfi, Nice, Positano, Marbella, etc.

Ivana-branded bottled water and fragrance

Ivana’s had a lot of experience in large real estate projects in the past, and in her first marriage to the father of her children, The Donald. She refurbished the Plaza back in those heady good ole days before someone got the supposedly bright idea of turning the landmark into a shopping mall. Ivana’s also had a hand in the Trump Grand Hyatt, the Trump Tower as well as Mr. Trump’s Atlantic City debut. And she’s already got her name on a residential tower on the Great Barrier Reef in Australia and last night she told she is planning on opening another in Shanghai.

On the dinner table last night, along with the rose petals, were bottles of her own Ivana water as well as her fragrances for men and women. She told me the Ivana Trump Las Vegas will be a “must-see destination for visitors all over the world.” Those who don’t buy a condo will have the option of renting for a day, a week, a month, while visiting the entertainment and gambling capital of the American West.

“There will be no gaming rooms but there will be restaurants, bars, a spa, shops, gyms, 24-hour concierge service and a host of other amenities befitting a five-star facility,” according to Ivana’s partner in the project, Victor Altomare, CEO Sahara Condominiums.

Meanwhile, Ivana's companion, Rossano Rubicondi, was telling me they spent most of June in London and then were in Monte Carlo for the Red Cross Ball. Now they are heading back to St. Tropez and the yacht for some parties and some cruising, and then returning to New York and then Beverly Hills, and then back to Europe and then on to Australia. No grass growing under their feet. Ten days is about the limit for this twosome and then it’s time to move on to the next project, the next party, the next chapter in their peripatetic lives.

Nikki Haskell and Bill Kapfer

Eric Trump

Denise and Larry Wohl

Victor Altomare and Ivana

Ivana and Rossano Rubicondi

Pamela Gross and Jimmy Finkelstein along with Cynthia and Dan Lufkin hosted a summer luncheon last Saturday at the Gross/Finkelstein Southampton residence to celebrate the Juilliard School’s upcoming Centennial Gala. Robbins-Wolfe catered with a menu starting with Vietnamese vegetables and mint spring rolls, figs wrapped with prosciutto and their signature cheese straws. At table on the breezy back porch of the 110-year-old house, guests enjoyed grilled salmon with a balsamic drizzle, Mediterranean pearl couscous, French green beans, red and golden beets and cucumber and local lettuce. Dessert? A white chocolate and semi-sweet chocolate mousse, fresh mango, pineapple and berries and small country cookies.

Pamela Gross and Cynthia Lufkin

Among the attending: Kitty Patterson Kempner, Pamela Fiori, Kathy and Rick Hilton, Sharon Bush, Jessie Araskog, Andrea Stark, Douglas Hannant, Ruth Fleischmann, Frederick Anderson, R. Couri Hay, Michèle Gerber Klein, Audrey Gruss, Jane Holzer, Plum Sykes and her fiance Toby Roland, Bettina Zilkha, Mai Harrison, Tinsley Mortimer, Christine Schott and Juilliard vice president Tony Newman. Karen LeFrak dropped by with two four month-old standard poodle puppies that had been sired by her beloved champion Mikimoto.

A trio of students performed as the Matisse Music Ensemble: flutist Adi Menczel, who has made solo appearances at Alice Tully Hall, performed with the Philadelphia Orchestra and can be heard on PBS’s “Reading Rainbow;” clarinetist Igor Begelman, a winner of the Avery Fisher Career Grant who has performed as a soloist with American and European orchestras, as well as the Chamber Music Society of Lincoln Center and at the Tanglewood festival; and bassoonist Larisa Gelman, who has performed with the Brooklyn Symphony, and at the Caramoor festival, and contributes to educational events organized by the New York Philharmonic Outreach Program, 92nd St Y, Midori and Friends Foundation, and Young Audiences.

Juilliard board member Kitty Patterson Kempner announced the school’s grand 100th birthday party. “Juilliard’s alumni make a unique contribution to cultural affairs every day in the world’s great theaters, opera houses, concert halls, and on television and in film,” she said. “The capstone event of the yearlong celebration will be a televised gala on April 3, 2006, which will include performances by some of Juilliard’s best-known alumni, including soprano Renee Fleming, violinist Itzhak Perlman, soprano Leontyne Price, pianist Emanuel Ax, jazz artist Wynton Marsalis and actors Laura Linney and Bradley Whitford. A tented dinner dance on the plaza over 65th Street at Lincoln Center will follow.

For tickets, which start at $1,500 each and go up to $500,000 for Philanthropist Tables and $1,000,000 for Lead Underwriters, call 914-579-1000.