Russian businessman buys Gianni Versace’s mansion in Italy
The mansion in Lake Como, Italy, which belonged to legendary fashion designer Gianni Versace killed in 1997, will be sold to Russian businessman Arkady Novikov.
The 19th century four-storey mansion used to be Versace’s favorite home. The mansion used to host such world-known celebrities and public figures as Elton John, Sting, Madonna and Princess Diana.
The mansion has been uninhabited during the recent decade, not to take into consideration the fact that US singer and actress Jennifer Lopez (article) spent her honeymoon in the Lake Como mansion in 2001.
The 46-year-old businessman, a restaurateur known as the “blini baron of Moscow,” is ready to pay 26 million pounds ($52 million) for the mansion. Novikov reportedly offered three million more to secure his deal.
Arkady Novikov is one of the most famous restaurant-owners in Moscow. His restaurants have become a part of Moscow’s places of interests, like museums and theaters. Born in 1962, Novikov started his career in the restaurant business in the 1990s, when his projects made him the first restaurateur of Moscow. In 1992, Novikov opened his first restaurant, Sirena, which became Moscow’s first fish restaurant. Sirena launched the post-Soviet development of the Russian restaurant business. In 1994 Novikov opened the French cuisine restaurant. He continued developing his business with the Russian cuisine restaurant opened in 1996, where then-president Boris Yeltsin had a dinner with then-president of France Jacques Chirac. Since 1992 Arkady Novikov has created over 30 restaurant projects, and all of them became successful.
Translated by Dmitry Sudakov
Pravda.ru
