FASHION ICON ANNA DELLO RUSSO IS CONSTANTLY IN SPOTLIGHT, EXCEPT WHEN HIDING IN HER SOUTH APULIA NEST Text by Olga Grinkrug

“My life is incredibly beautiful, but it consumes so much energy that I require a break — something akin to a visual detox or an acoustic rehab,” Anna says when asked about her southern home.

This is hardly surprising: during the four couture weeks, Vogue Japan creative director storms from Paris to Milan, from Tokyo to New York and has to make a change of dress a hundred times. “At some point, I realised I can’t keep up with that rhythm,” says Russo, 54.

“I’ve got mature, apparently. Time to go back to my roots.”

Her roots stem from southern Italy, right at the heel — Apulia. Not particularly rich in palaces and villas, but with plenty of sea, rocks, vineyards and olive trees. Main local attractions are circular stone buildings with funny roofs, and a cartoonish name — trulli. They are declared historical sites, and forbidden to demolish. Permission is granted only to get a modern filling for the ancient shell. Signora Anna took the first opportunity to do so.

“Twelve years ago I decided time was ripe to invest in my native region, lest it be captured by British. I bought a trullo with a vineyard and felt like Ulysses making a homecoming”.

THE APEX OF CREATION

BY THE AGE OF THIRTY ELENA PERMINOVA MANAGED TO REVERSE HER FATE TWICE, GIVE BIRTH THREE TIMES, AND HELP SOME FIFTY SICK CHILDREN.

Text by Alexey Tarkhanov (Kommersant) Today there is a Lancome party, where — insider’s tip — one needs a red outfit.

“My agent is browsing through brands that have anything red,” Perminova says.
In the evening she will be photographed in red and likes and hearts will fly in. They are pleasing, but not that important by themselves; they help Lena do business — an ins-tagram-based auction that pays for children’s treatment. Perminova’s boyfriend prominent businessman Alexander Lebedev helped with the name — @sos_by_lenaperminova. She gets SOS signals from anywhere, where they speak Russian, and there are sick children. There won’t be millions of followers, but in a year they gathered a million and half dollars, that helped saving fifty one sick children.

UNCLE FYODOR

GOLDEN-HAIRED PERFORMANCE GOD FYODOR PAVLOV-ANDREEVICH TELLS CLOSE FRIEND ANNA KARABASH WHERE TO LOOK FOR HIS NAKED BODY THIS MAY The queue at the opening of the new Garage gallery; high society beauties and their husbands — bankers, billionaires, European dukes and American filmmakers, including Woody Allen himself. All dressed up to the nine, meekly waiting in line to present their invitations. Yet one of the guests appears to be naked, curled up in a fetal position inside a large glass box. Impossible to get rid of — the box weighs a hundred kilos and has no handles, and more importantly the person inside it appears to be on the list so there is no apparent reason to dismiss him. Guests are ecstatic, security and organisers stunned. “Fyodor has been foundling-ed,” a young socialite posts in Instagram.

The handsome blond has been known in
Moscow as a journalist, PR man and art curator, but a few years ago, he decided he is a performance artist. And the incident described above is an episode from a series of performances called The Foundling.

— It was not my first, but I planned the Garage stunt in June 2015 with extra thoroughness, as there were at least fifty securities. Because Abramovich.

EPISTLE OF PETER

PYOTR AVEN, THE BANKER, WROTE A BOOK ABOUT BILLIONAIRE BORIS BEREZOVSKY WHOM HE WAS AT ODDS WITH FOR THE FINAL EIGHT YEARS OF HIS VENTURESOME LIFE.

Text by Ksenia Solovieva Following the trial Berezovsky declined to shake hands with Aven. They met by chance in London’s private Aspinall’s Club a few months later. Aven came in, while Berezovsky was being interviewed sitting on a couch.

Aven stretched out his hand, Boris Abramovich stared at it for a long time, but didn’t shake it. Aven’s wife Elena came in next. She and Berezovsky were always on good terms, she was listed as an employee in his laboratory once in order to have an official workplace.

She rushed to give him a kiss: “Borenka!” He reacted the same as with her husband. A year later at billionaire Yuri Schefler’s birthday party the host attempted to sit them near each other, but Berezovsky declined to share a table with his ex-friend.

— Frankly speaking, there was no reason for such behaviour. But Boris declared us conformists, blamed us for cooperating with authorities — his strife against Putin was in full swing. Many of his friends have said afterwards that he was sorry. Although had he really wanted to make amends, he could have simply picked up the phone and dialed my number.

Aven, on his part, did not call either.