ICON OF THE MONTH
In conversation with LUISA BERTOLDO
How do you balance your role as a mother and entrepreneur?
In the past I promised myself that work wouldn't take 90% of my space, so I decided the total should be formed of work, family, others and myself. I always try to find an equal balance between these aspects.
Well, I love the wool berets (especially the yellow one),
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In conversation with DENIZ AKALIN AGNELLI
and then I went to the States to study architecture at Princeton.
But one thing led to another and I ended up not practising architecture until a couple of years ago. I started working in Events Management and Arts for a very big auction house in Istanbul, in Geneva; I worked a little bit in New York and then I went back to Istanbul and then I came to Milan for love and stayed in Italy since then (10 years).
I’m an Italian citizen and I have three daughters: Mila (7), Livia (3) and Vera (2) so the two little ones are very close to one another and I did full time mumming for that period.
Lately, for the past two years almost, I am Head of International Projects for Milan based interiors brand VMaison, the brand of my close friend Veronica Zimbaro, so we work together and we do lots of tailor made projects.
How do you balance your family, your little children and your work? Let’s not forget that you are also the partner of Juventus’s Chairman, Andrea Agnelli, so you also have the visibility, the social events…
This question makes me smile because it's a question that only gets asked to women because men, I don't know why, don't have to balance anything.
Does Andrea support you? Nowadays men are much more different compared to the men of our parents' age, when for women it was normal to be a mother and not too independent and accomplished professionally.
Yeah, of course. Women as mothers, as wives or companions need also to be able to manage the relationship with our partners in which they help with the family.
I know for example that Andrea loves picking up the girls from school so there are certain days that I know he can't do it so I won't even ask him obviously, he's busy and I know it. But then there are other days when I know he's maybe a little freer and he will make that 20 minutes of pick up time available in his calendar which is I think very important for the girls to see that their father is also participating in daily life.
If you have browsed our website, what are the 3 top pieces that you would love from Marzoline?
I think you've understood that I'm a big fan of velvet so especially in this period of Christmas and winter I love your velvet headbands especially in burgundy, gold and green.
One more thing is the eco-leather scrunchie because maybe when we don't feel chic enough we can put on it and just go out and the eco-leather gives you the ads to be a bit more stylish.
Going back to your past, what would you say to your younger self?
Going through Instagram I just bumped into this quote that says: Work on you for you.
I think it's really important because my younger self used to care a lot about what other people thought, other people would say, how I would be perceived and I think society places a lot of importance on how people comment on you know and sometimes if you don't really get out of it it's very difficult to focus on yourself and to be yourself.
My advice to my younger self would be Work on you for you, not for anyone else but for yourself so read more, travel more, do things that you like, focus on your goals and then risk more!
photo credits Umberto Costamagna