The Verdura Diaries | Fulco and Flato

foreign [Music] when it came to New York in 1934 he came with two friends a man named Nikki de gonsberg who was a Russian Baron he had the title he basically had very little money because his family the Jewish family had made their money in oil in Russia before the Revolution and of course lost it in the revolution the other person he traveled with was a woman named Natasha Paley she was the niece of the czar and she was also she was a princess anyway so the three of them all with titles arrived in New York with no money and immediately went out to Holly with the hope of getting work or doing something because everybody in Europe was taken by the glamor of Hollywood Nikki actually got a job working in the movies he played the part of Dracula in one of the movies and Natasha ended up actually being an actress sort of a b actress she used to play a lot with in films with Catherine Hepburn verdura did not find work he was hoping to design costumes but no one wanted him as a costume designer so he went back to New York and he got a job we don't know exactly how it came about but we know the job uh was the person that helped him get a job was Diana Vreeland again who keeps popping up she knew the society jeweler in New York who was the most important jeweler in New York at the time a man named Paul flato and flato wasn't a designer but he had people designing for him and he had an uh he had a very very successful business Not only was he successful in New York he was very successful selling to Hollywood stars so flato hired verdura and very shortly thereafter well the reason I'm sure he hired him was because he everybody knew that he was a designer for Chanel so that was a feather in his hat to have Chanel's designer designing his jewelry and pretty soon the ads changed from uh Paul fledo jewelry to Paul fledo jewelry designed by the Duke de verdura so he he was making a name for himself before he even even got it out of the box he was he was being publicized and I mean he made some very interesting things in fact a book came out a couple years ago about Plato and the piece on the cover was the was the very first important piece that verdura designed when he came when he started working for fledo and it was made again for Porter it was commissioned by by Cole Porter for his wife Linda it's quite dramatic anyway so um he worked for flato in New York for about a year and a half and then flato wanted to open a store in Hollywood and he uh he he opened a rather beautiful store sort of Art Deco store on Sunset Boulevard and he sent verdura out to Hollywood to run it so overdore was in Hollywood for I guess about a year and a half for two years and then in the um end of 1939 it came to light unfortunately that Paul flato had a cocaine habit and he'd been swapping his clients real stones for fake ones and it was Front Page New York Times news and he was sentenced to Sing Sing prison which is pretty bad for a jeweler and it's pretty bad prison too anyway everybody knew that verdura was his head designer by that time so his boss went as it were up the river which is where it is and uh that again it was sort of unfortunate in a way I mean that it happened that way but they gave verdura the opportunity to open his own business and he was he had the background of being worked for fledo in Hollywood he'd worked with all the clients in New York and he's a very lucky man to be in the right place at the right time after uh Paul Slater went to jail at the basic I think it was the end of August well foco decided because he was the designer that he would he would have an opportunity to start his own business because flato had a great clientele and where were they going to go and also the clientele knew that foco had been designing the jewelry not only on the East Coast but the West Coast the Hollywood crowd knew him because he'd been out there so he he went to his friend yet again Cole Porter and Cole gave him ten thousand dollars and he he went to Vincent Astor who he also know was the richest man in New York but also head of sort of society people here in New York anyway um they each put up ten thousand dollars and with the seed money he rented an office on the fourth floor of 7 12 5th which was the original office of carte when they first moved here before they got the townhouse on 52nd Street and off and running he had he decorated it and sort of read it did look and sort of red plush with lots of gold trim and he uh it was well it was also the same day the Germans invaded Poland so the Americans that were used to going to Europe to buy their jewelry and then Americans were known to buy Joey mostly in Paris they couldn't go so he had a captive audience and he he had the reputation of having designed Chanel's jewelry personal jewelry he had the reputation for having designed for uh flato for five years so he uh he was off and running and he became pretty much an instant success [Music] foreign [Music] foreign

Channel: Verdura

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Id: JlYAod5UrbA

Length: 6min 9sec (369 seconds)

Published: Tue Jul 11 2023