Women's mane attraction
2
★
16 January/17 January 2016
FTWeekend
House Home
Women’s mane attraction
David Tang Agony uncle
It seems that the longer a lady’s hair is, the more she flicks it. To wit, I find long hair not just boring but a throwback to what women must have looked like in the days of cave dwellings and no hair stylists. Is flicking one’s hair from right to left a manifestation that their long hair is bothersome or is it body language for “admire me”? Have you never seen Raquel Welch in the film One Million Years BC? Just look at its iconic poster and you will not have any cause for complaint about women in prehistoric cave dwellings without hair stylists! Indeed, as far as I am concerned, Raquel can flick her hair in and out of her cave, from dawn till dusk, and not a strand of my hair will be ruffled! The fact is that a long mane of hair on women is very attractive to men. Remember Lady Godiva who had long hair and rode naked on a white horse through the city of Coventry? That was another irresistible icon. Her husband, the Earl of Mercia, had imposed heavy taxes on his subjects, and said he would only remit them if his wife, who pleaded on behalf of the people, stripped naked and rode through the town. Everyone
was told to close their windows and all did so, except for a tailor called Tom who drilled a hole in his shutters and became the eponymous Peeping Tom! Anyway, it is surely the prerogative of a woman to have long hair, which she might throw back with an arching head, or run her fingers through as she speaks, or, even at times, twist a loose strand and chew its end, all of which to attract attention. These are animal sexual instincts that have come to define feminine allurement stretching back to Eve at the beginning of time. Long may it last until the end of time! My wife and I recently attended a performance of Handel’s Messiah at Saint Thomas Church on Fifth Avenue, New York. Sitting in front of us was a couple that whispered occasionally during the performance but at one point began what was almost a conversation. I tapped the women on the shoulder, received no acknowledgment and was about to do so again when my wife grabbed my arm and, bowing to a cooler head, I desisted. The nattering ceased and I began to enjoy the superb performance. I was later told that I
shouldn’t have touched the offending party. Could you please advise on the correct procedure/protocol in dealing with a similar situation given that I did not wish to make a noise and was lacking pencil and paper? Tapping involves contact and is technically the beginning of an assault. Better to lean forward and just make the “Shhh” noise. You can first do so pianissimo then, if the disturbance persists, follow it with a longer fortissimo. If it still doesn’t work then bring out your extended selfie stick and protrude it in front of the offenders, behind whom you might contort your face and stick your tongue out. Then post and expose them on social media as noise pariahs. I also encounter insufferable noises and smells in cinemas: packets of crisps, boxes of chocolate and, worst of all, stinking hot dogs or tortilla crisps with salsa! They totally ruin one’s peace and quiet in the darkness for an hour or two. I now sometimes bring a torch and strobe it around the culprits. But going back to oratorios, did you know that in Bach’s days, when St Matthew Passion was performed, the entire audience or congregation was
T
he two curling tattoos peeking out from under his pressed, cuff-linked shirt cuffs give Luca Cordero di Montezemolo a raffish air. The 68-year-old former head of Ferrari bounds around his sitting room in Rome, pointing out favourite pieces in his pop-art collection. Slim, in his tailored blue suit, with boyish long hair, Montezemolo radiates energy and charm, advising me on the best local coffee bars, which he tours on his Vespa on Saturday mornings. The fading tattoos are a playful touch on the arms of the industrialist, who was tipped in 2011 to be joint prime minister of Italy, alongside technocrat Mario Monti. He acquired them in 2005, with his wife, Ludovica Andreoni, 43, a former swimwear designer. The couple met in 1999 when he dived from a boat to save her bulldog from drowning — and was bitten for his trouble. I drink espresso while Montezemolo talks at Formula One speed, fending off interruptions from Lupo, his five-yearold son. The youngster is off school after
Montezemolo took him out late to a WWF wrestling show. Lupo scuttles in and out strumming a guitar before going outside to play football with the driver. Montezemolo is as boisterous as his son. It is difficult to keep up. The family lives on the third floor of a mid-20th-century palazzo in Parioli, an area favoured by Rome’s alta borghesia or upper classes. The apartment is rather low key, but contains a trophy hunter’s haul of conceptual, modern and pop art, Montezemolo’s passion since a “wild” period he spent at Columbia University in the 1970s. Mad Men-style 1960s armchairs sit alongside antique Chinese vases. A chocolate Labrador, Nina, and a German Shepherd, Sean, run riot on a jasmine-fringed balcony. The family has three more dogs, two parrots, three donkeys and nine turtles at their estate in the hills outside Bologna, where they produce olive oil and wine, and where Montezemolo hunts wild boar. They also have homes in Anacapri, Cortina, Paris and Abu Dhabi, says Montezemolo, displaying pictures of his 120ft-long 1950s motoryacht. The couple moved to Rome in 2008. Montezemolo is now leading the city’s bid to host the 2024 Olympic Games. His vision is to stage Olympic events in the Colosseum and the Circus Maximus. “Can you imagine the marathon beginning inside the Vatican, passing a mosque and synagogue, with the finish line under the Arch of Constantine, where the Romans celebrated their victories?” asks Montezemolo. Critics have ridiculed the bid, saying that Rome, mired in a corruption trial dubbed “Mafia Capitale”, is not fit for the event. The games, they say, would be a gift to organised crime. Yet Montezemolo is adamant. “If we assume that, because of corruption, we are not in a condition to run in competition with cities such as Paris, Hamburg and LA, we may as well just shut up shop now,” he says. “I don’t want to underestimate what is going on here, but sometimes we assume that corruption is only in Italy.”
If that doesn’t work then bring out your extended selfie stick and protrude it in front of the noisy offenders
How many Christmas cards did you receive? Do you send out as many? What do you do with them afterwards? My wife and I long ago became too lazy to send Christmas cards, in the hope of receiving fewer. But it hasn’t happened. We get loads. I immediately jettison those sent with catalogues or in blatant disguise as trade, and those with no signature or with a printed signature. On the whole, it is simply not worth keeping any card without one’s name inside. Otherwise, I keep all the funny ones and mostly the ones with photographs of ugly children or ageing parents or, thankfully, dogs. Yes we only really love the ones with dogs. But at Epiphany, the whole lot is tipped into the waste paper basket. To post comments and questions, visit ft.com/life-arts/david-tang or email [email protected]
Main sitting room of the apartment in Rome
Photographs: Emanuele Camerini
‘The least I expected from the owners was an official thank you. I didn’t expect a present, but at least thanks’
expected to stand up and join in the famous chorus. I did that last at St John’s Smith Square in London, and it really was exciting to have a few hundred people rising to sing the chorus — three times in all.
Bookshelf featuring a photograph of Montezemolo with Pope Benedict
At home | Italian industrialist Luca Cordero di Montezemolo looks back on 23 years as head of Ferrari and his latest ambitions to revive airline Alitalia and bring the Olympics to Rome. By Hannah Roberts
Revved up for new challenges Model of an Alitalia airbus
Montezemolo playing football with his son, Lupo, in the courtyard
Montezemolo sees the Olympics as an opportunity for Rome to update its infrastructure, which has moved on little since the city last hosted the games in 1960. “Without a major challenge, without a goal, without competition it will be extremely difficult to give a push to this town,” he says. The project, a labour of love, was foisted on him by Italy’s prime minister Matteo Renzi. Renzi has also tasked Montezemolo with saving Alitalia, where he is now chief executive. A year ago, the airline was on the verge of collapse, but since Montezemolo orchestrated the sale of 49 per cent of the company to Emirates, he claims to have made huge steps in changing the “culture”. “You have to remember that, except for the last few years, it has always been a state-owned company. In the past, if a politician said we have to keep a route because it was important for political reasons, Alitalia was forced to maintain it, even if it didn’t make money.” Montezemolo took on both projects after quitting Ferrari, where he had been president since 1991, under a cloud. Despite winning 14 driver and constructor world championships in 23
years, the company’s Formula One team had been fading, and had not won a world title since 2008. Disagreements with Sergio Marchionne, chief executive of Ferrari’s then owner Fiat, spilled into public view when Montezemolo resigned in September 2014. In his time at Ferrari Montezemolo had brought his passion for art and design to the company, giving all its designers subscriptions to Vogue and Vanity Fair in his first year. “I wanted to expose them to the latest trends,” he says. “It was seen as very unusual but it brought about major improvements in colour, details and interior.” However, he feels that his contribution has not been recognised. “When Ferrari went public [in October 2015], of the results they presented, 23 of 24 years were down to me and my people,” he says. “So the least I expected from the owners was an official thank you. I didn’t expect a present because the value [of the
Life-size artwork of Montezemolo sitting on the bonnet of a F1 Ferrari company at $9.8bn in the initial public offering] was unbelievable, but at least a thanks.” Since then, Montezemolo has sold his white FF four-wheel drive Ferrari. He currently owns a Vespa, a Panda, a Range Rover and one remaining Ferrari, a silver metallic, custom-made Barchetta 360, given to him by Fiat’s former head, Giovanni Agnelli, who was best man at his wedding. “But it’s still in the museum. It’s got such a small windscreen, you need goggles and a helmet to drive it.” Despite the bitter departure he still sees Ferrari as “the most important part of my life, along with my family”. Traces
Favourite thing Montezemolo offers a glimpse into the couple’s bedroom, which contains a host of nudes, including perhaps his most valuable work, a rare Lichtenstein from the artist’s mid-1990s Nudes series. Yet his favourite piece is a map by Alighiero e Boetti, the Italian Arte Povera artist, woven as a tapestry by Afghan craftsmen. “I like it because it’s handmade and reminds me of the world more than 20 years ago, before the end of the Cold War. All the countries of the USSR are still there.”
of the carmaker are visible around the apartment: a logoed umbrella and a silver cigarette box; a luminescent image by the hyper-real photographer Andreas Gursky depicts a crowd of technicians surrounding a Ferrari in a pitstop, while rows of spectators look down on the lighted scene like the celestial body in a painting by Raphael. Other references include two mirror paintings by Michelangelo Pistoletto. One, which the artist gave him, is printed with a lifesize image of a grinning Montezemolo sitting on the bonnet of a F1 Ferrari. “A nice souvenir,” he quips. For Montezemolo, the cars themselves are a work of art. “It’s that familiar feeling. Even without the prancing horse, when you see the car, you know it’s a Ferrari.” He admires other brands with strong images such as Hermès, Patek Phillipe, and Tod’s, whose chief executive is his best friend, Diego Della Valle. Tod’s is like Ferrari, “always the same, but always new”, he says. He pulls up his shirt to show me the Tod’s cowboy belt he is wearing, “See. Even these were my idea — I told Diego to make them.” If Montezemolo ever had time for a breather, he would combine his two great passions, Ferrari and Italy. “I love my country,” he says. “If I could have one month off, I would go to Puglia, Tuscany and Umbria in a convertible Ferrari California. You just flick a switch and the top flies off. I love that.” In much the same way, perhaps, Montezemolo would like to flick a switch and shift a sluggish Italy into top gear.
★
16 January/17 January 2016
FTWeekend
House Home
Women’s mane attraction
David Tang Agony uncle
It seems that the longer a lady’s hair is, the more she flicks it. To wit, I find long hair not just boring but a throwback to what women must have looked like in the days of cave dwellings and no hair stylists. Is flicking one’s hair from right to left a manifestation that their long hair is bothersome or is it body language for “admire me”? Have you never seen Raquel Welch in the film One Million Years BC? Just look at its iconic poster and you will not have any cause for complaint about women in prehistoric cave dwellings without hair stylists! Indeed, as far as I am concerned, Raquel can flick her hair in and out of her cave, from dawn till dusk, and not a strand of my hair will be ruffled! The fact is that a long mane of hair on women is very attractive to men. Remember Lady Godiva who had long hair and rode naked on a white horse through the city of Coventry? That was another irresistible icon. Her husband, the Earl of Mercia, had imposed heavy taxes on his subjects, and said he would only remit them if his wife, who pleaded on behalf of the people, stripped naked and rode through the town. Everyone
was told to close their windows and all did so, except for a tailor called Tom who drilled a hole in his shutters and became the eponymous Peeping Tom! Anyway, it is surely the prerogative of a woman to have long hair, which she might throw back with an arching head, or run her fingers through as she speaks, or, even at times, twist a loose strand and chew its end, all of which to attract attention. These are animal sexual instincts that have come to define feminine allurement stretching back to Eve at the beginning of time. Long may it last until the end of time! My wife and I recently attended a performance of Handel’s Messiah at Saint Thomas Church on Fifth Avenue, New York. Sitting in front of us was a couple that whispered occasionally during the performance but at one point began what was almost a conversation. I tapped the women on the shoulder, received no acknowledgment and was about to do so again when my wife grabbed my arm and, bowing to a cooler head, I desisted. The nattering ceased and I began to enjoy the superb performance. I was later told that I
shouldn’t have touched the offending party. Could you please advise on the correct procedure/protocol in dealing with a similar situation given that I did not wish to make a noise and was lacking pencil and paper? Tapping involves contact and is technically the beginning of an assault. Better to lean forward and just make the “Shhh” noise. You can first do so pianissimo then, if the disturbance persists, follow it with a longer fortissimo. If it still doesn’t work then bring out your extended selfie stick and protrude it in front of the offenders, behind whom you might contort your face and stick your tongue out. Then post and expose them on social media as noise pariahs. I also encounter insufferable noises and smells in cinemas: packets of crisps, boxes of chocolate and, worst of all, stinking hot dogs or tortilla crisps with salsa! They totally ruin one’s peace and quiet in the darkness for an hour or two. I now sometimes bring a torch and strobe it around the culprits. But going back to oratorios, did you know that in Bach’s days, when St Matthew Passion was performed, the entire audience or congregation was
T
he two curling tattoos peeking out from under his pressed, cuff-linked shirt cuffs give Luca Cordero di Montezemolo a raffish air. The 68-year-old former head of Ferrari bounds around his sitting room in Rome, pointing out favourite pieces in his pop-art collection. Slim, in his tailored blue suit, with boyish long hair, Montezemolo radiates energy and charm, advising me on the best local coffee bars, which he tours on his Vespa on Saturday mornings. The fading tattoos are a playful touch on the arms of the industrialist, who was tipped in 2011 to be joint prime minister of Italy, alongside technocrat Mario Monti. He acquired them in 2005, with his wife, Ludovica Andreoni, 43, a former swimwear designer. The couple met in 1999 when he dived from a boat to save her bulldog from drowning — and was bitten for his trouble. I drink espresso while Montezemolo talks at Formula One speed, fending off interruptions from Lupo, his five-yearold son. The youngster is off school after
Montezemolo took him out late to a WWF wrestling show. Lupo scuttles in and out strumming a guitar before going outside to play football with the driver. Montezemolo is as boisterous as his son. It is difficult to keep up. The family lives on the third floor of a mid-20th-century palazzo in Parioli, an area favoured by Rome’s alta borghesia or upper classes. The apartment is rather low key, but contains a trophy hunter’s haul of conceptual, modern and pop art, Montezemolo’s passion since a “wild” period he spent at Columbia University in the 1970s. Mad Men-style 1960s armchairs sit alongside antique Chinese vases. A chocolate Labrador, Nina, and a German Shepherd, Sean, run riot on a jasmine-fringed balcony. The family has three more dogs, two parrots, three donkeys and nine turtles at their estate in the hills outside Bologna, where they produce olive oil and wine, and where Montezemolo hunts wild boar. They also have homes in Anacapri, Cortina, Paris and Abu Dhabi, says Montezemolo, displaying pictures of his 120ft-long 1950s motoryacht. The couple moved to Rome in 2008. Montezemolo is now leading the city’s bid to host the 2024 Olympic Games. His vision is to stage Olympic events in the Colosseum and the Circus Maximus. “Can you imagine the marathon beginning inside the Vatican, passing a mosque and synagogue, with the finish line under the Arch of Constantine, where the Romans celebrated their victories?” asks Montezemolo. Critics have ridiculed the bid, saying that Rome, mired in a corruption trial dubbed “Mafia Capitale”, is not fit for the event. The games, they say, would be a gift to organised crime. Yet Montezemolo is adamant. “If we assume that, because of corruption, we are not in a condition to run in competition with cities such as Paris, Hamburg and LA, we may as well just shut up shop now,” he says. “I don’t want to underestimate what is going on here, but sometimes we assume that corruption is only in Italy.”
If that doesn’t work then bring out your extended selfie stick and protrude it in front of the noisy offenders
How many Christmas cards did you receive? Do you send out as many? What do you do with them afterwards? My wife and I long ago became too lazy to send Christmas cards, in the hope of receiving fewer. But it hasn’t happened. We get loads. I immediately jettison those sent with catalogues or in blatant disguise as trade, and those with no signature or with a printed signature. On the whole, it is simply not worth keeping any card without one’s name inside. Otherwise, I keep all the funny ones and mostly the ones with photographs of ugly children or ageing parents or, thankfully, dogs. Yes we only really love the ones with dogs. But at Epiphany, the whole lot is tipped into the waste paper basket. To post comments and questions, visit ft.com/life-arts/david-tang or email [email protected]
Main sitting room of the apartment in Rome
Photographs: Emanuele Camerini
‘The least I expected from the owners was an official thank you. I didn’t expect a present, but at least thanks’
expected to stand up and join in the famous chorus. I did that last at St John’s Smith Square in London, and it really was exciting to have a few hundred people rising to sing the chorus — three times in all.
Bookshelf featuring a photograph of Montezemolo with Pope Benedict
At home | Italian industrialist Luca Cordero di Montezemolo looks back on 23 years as head of Ferrari and his latest ambitions to revive airline Alitalia and bring the Olympics to Rome. By Hannah Roberts
Revved up for new challenges Model of an Alitalia airbus
Montezemolo playing football with his son, Lupo, in the courtyard
Montezemolo sees the Olympics as an opportunity for Rome to update its infrastructure, which has moved on little since the city last hosted the games in 1960. “Without a major challenge, without a goal, without competition it will be extremely difficult to give a push to this town,” he says. The project, a labour of love, was foisted on him by Italy’s prime minister Matteo Renzi. Renzi has also tasked Montezemolo with saving Alitalia, where he is now chief executive. A year ago, the airline was on the verge of collapse, but since Montezemolo orchestrated the sale of 49 per cent of the company to Emirates, he claims to have made huge steps in changing the “culture”. “You have to remember that, except for the last few years, it has always been a state-owned company. In the past, if a politician said we have to keep a route because it was important for political reasons, Alitalia was forced to maintain it, even if it didn’t make money.” Montezemolo took on both projects after quitting Ferrari, where he had been president since 1991, under a cloud. Despite winning 14 driver and constructor world championships in 23
years, the company’s Formula One team had been fading, and had not won a world title since 2008. Disagreements with Sergio Marchionne, chief executive of Ferrari’s then owner Fiat, spilled into public view when Montezemolo resigned in September 2014. In his time at Ferrari Montezemolo had brought his passion for art and design to the company, giving all its designers subscriptions to Vogue and Vanity Fair in his first year. “I wanted to expose them to the latest trends,” he says. “It was seen as very unusual but it brought about major improvements in colour, details and interior.” However, he feels that his contribution has not been recognised. “When Ferrari went public [in October 2015], of the results they presented, 23 of 24 years were down to me and my people,” he says. “So the least I expected from the owners was an official thank you. I didn’t expect a present because the value [of the
Life-size artwork of Montezemolo sitting on the bonnet of a F1 Ferrari company at $9.8bn in the initial public offering] was unbelievable, but at least a thanks.” Since then, Montezemolo has sold his white FF four-wheel drive Ferrari. He currently owns a Vespa, a Panda, a Range Rover and one remaining Ferrari, a silver metallic, custom-made Barchetta 360, given to him by Fiat’s former head, Giovanni Agnelli, who was best man at his wedding. “But it’s still in the museum. It’s got such a small windscreen, you need goggles and a helmet to drive it.” Despite the bitter departure he still sees Ferrari as “the most important part of my life, along with my family”. Traces
Favourite thing Montezemolo offers a glimpse into the couple’s bedroom, which contains a host of nudes, including perhaps his most valuable work, a rare Lichtenstein from the artist’s mid-1990s Nudes series. Yet his favourite piece is a map by Alighiero e Boetti, the Italian Arte Povera artist, woven as a tapestry by Afghan craftsmen. “I like it because it’s handmade and reminds me of the world more than 20 years ago, before the end of the Cold War. All the countries of the USSR are still there.”
of the carmaker are visible around the apartment: a logoed umbrella and a silver cigarette box; a luminescent image by the hyper-real photographer Andreas Gursky depicts a crowd of technicians surrounding a Ferrari in a pitstop, while rows of spectators look down on the lighted scene like the celestial body in a painting by Raphael. Other references include two mirror paintings by Michelangelo Pistoletto. One, which the artist gave him, is printed with a lifesize image of a grinning Montezemolo sitting on the bonnet of a F1 Ferrari. “A nice souvenir,” he quips. For Montezemolo, the cars themselves are a work of art. “It’s that familiar feeling. Even without the prancing horse, when you see the car, you know it’s a Ferrari.” He admires other brands with strong images such as Hermès, Patek Phillipe, and Tod’s, whose chief executive is his best friend, Diego Della Valle. Tod’s is like Ferrari, “always the same, but always new”, he says. He pulls up his shirt to show me the Tod’s cowboy belt he is wearing, “See. Even these were my idea — I told Diego to make them.” If Montezemolo ever had time for a breather, he would combine his two great passions, Ferrari and Italy. “I love my country,” he says. “If I could have one month off, I would go to Puglia, Tuscany and Umbria in a convertible Ferrari California. You just flick a switch and the top flies off. I love that.” In much the same way, perhaps, Montezemolo would like to flick a switch and shift a sluggish Italy into top gear.
