A mysterious Russian billionaire has trumped his big-spending rivals and broken a world record by splashing out €500 million (£392 million, or $750 Million) on one of the dopest villas on the French Riviera.
The price of the Villa Leopolda, a Belle Époque mansion on the heights of Villefrance, has amazed estate agents but fuelled local worries that the invasion of Russian money on the Côte d’Azur is getting out of hand.
Since the early 1990s, Russian oligarchs, drawn by memories of the Riviera-mad old Russian aristocracy, have been piling into seaside properties at Cap Ferrat, Cap d’Antibes, Saint-Tropez and the other great playgrounds.
The previous record for a house was said to be the £57 million that Lakshmi Mittal, the steel tycoon, paid for a property in Kensington Palace Gardens in 2004.
The price for the Leopolda, which once belonged to the late Gianni Agnelli, the Fiat tycoon, has dwarfed the €20 million paid six years ago by Roman Abramovich, the Chelsea Football Club owner, for the semi-derelict Château de la Croë.
The house was owned previously by Lily Safra, the widow of Edmond Safra, a Lebanese banker who was killed by an arsonist’s fire in Switzerland in 2003. I remember this whole fire thing, it was mad fishy.
When the crib was Gianni Agnelli it was the setting of many a “Jet-Set” gig. Back in the days of the true International Playboys.
The true cost of this crib is going to keep it stocked with champagne.
Time for a trip to Côte d’Azur…
The Rest is Up to You…
Michael Porfirio Mason AKA The Peoples Champ AKA Your favorite International Playboy’s favorite International Playboy AKA Michael Dynamite The Guide to Getting More out of Life http://www.thegmanifesto.com
The second property to open on the Las Vegas Strip,The Frontier casino-hotel was imploded on Tuesday.
The 16-story Frontier Casino was felled with over 1,000 pounds of explosives to make way for a multibillion-dollar resort which is set to open in 2011.
Elad Group owner and Israeli billionaire Yitzhak Tshuva, who is partnering to build an $8 billion megaresort where the New Frontier stood, was on hand.
Las Vegas New Frontier Hotel Implosion
The Frontier was the first “themed” casino in Las Vegas. It was also is very well known for being the first place that Elvis Presley performed in the city. Ronald Regan also performed at The Frontier. Billionaire Howard Hughes once owned it as well.
IDB Group and Elad Group, the owner of The Plaza hotel in New York, said the new property will include a luxury hotel with about 3,500 rooms. There will of course be the de rigueur residences and high end retail stores. No doubt aiming for the high end of the marketplace. Which of course, is the future of the Las Vegas Strip. High-end all the way.
The north end of the strip has and is going through a lot of changes. Donald Trump’s condo towers is going to open early next year. Wynn’s $2.2 billion Encore is supposed to be completed in early 2009. Also in 2009 is the $2.8 billion dollar Fontainebleau Hotel. MGM Mirage is also working on mega project with Kerzner International (the cats behind The Atlantis in The Bahamas) and Dubai World for The Strip’s North End in 2012.
Sounds like we got some fun casino openings to hit up.
It seems everywhere you turn today there is an attack on our liberty to smoke. Even the fools in Hollywood have jumped into the game. Talk about a blow to artistic integrity. The hypocrisy of it all doesn’t sit well with me. Everyone seems to ignore the Social, Psychological, and Aesthetic benefits to smoking. I am convinced that anyone that is anti-smoking has never sat in a booth of a top shelf restaurant drinking Vino and smoking cigarettes with a Parisian Model Girl. Look into it. You will be pro-smoking too.
If I look back on my young life, my finest moments have consisted of a Custom Italian suit, a full-bodied red, a key to a penthouse suite in my pocket, a bankroll thick like Beyonce and Vida Guerra, a booth in a Michelin starred restaurant, a beautiful girl looking at me, hypnotized and a lit cigarette dangling from my mouth. Moments like those, are to me, what Life is all about (and of course what happens succeeding). The rest is just bullshit.
“Those who would give up essential liberty to purchase a little temporary safety deserve neither liberty nor safety.”
Benjamin Franklin
“There’s something luxurious about having a girl light your cigarette. In fact, I got married once on account of that.” ~Harold Robbins
“My rule of life prescribed as an absolutely sacred rite smoking cigars and also the drinking of alcohol before, after and if need be during all meals and in the intervals between them.” – Winston Churchill (Considered by many to be “The Greatest Man of the Twentieth Century”)
Monica Bellucci smoking
“A cigarette is the perfect type of a perfect pleasure. It is exquisite, and it leaves one unsatisfied. What more can one want?” ~Oscar Wilde, The Picture of Dorian Gray
Is it true that you smoke eight to ten cigars a day?
That’s true.
Is it true that you drink five martinis a day?
That’s true.
Is it true that you still surround yourself with beautiful young women?
That’s true.
What does your doctor say about all of this?
My doctor is dead.
– George Burns
“There’s nothing like tobacco; it is the passion of all decent men-a man who lives without tobacco does not deserve to live.”
Moliere
“The natural progress of things is for liberty to yield and government to gain ground.” – Thomas Jefferson
“The urge to save humanity is almost always a false front for the urge to rule.” – H.L. Mencken
Fly Model smokes
“There’s no way to rule innocent men. The only power any government has is the power to crack down on criminals. Well, when there aren’t enough criminals, one makes them. One declares so many things to be a crime that it becomes impossible to live without breaking laws.”
Ayn Rand, Atlas Shrugged
“I don’t know. Everything. Living. Smoking” – John Paul Sartre (answering the question “What is the most important thing in your life?”)
“When an opponent declares, ‘I will not come over to your side,’ I calmly say, ‘Your child belongs to us already… What are you? You will pass on. Your descendants, however, now stand in the new camp. In a short time they will know nothing else but this new community.’
– Adolf Hitler (The king of anti-smoking campaigns, about as bad as our current government)
“If alcohol is queen, then tobacco is her consort. It’s a fond companion for all occasions, a loyal friend through fair weather and foul. People smoke to celebrate a happy moment, or to hide a bitter regret. Whether you’re alone or with friends, it’s a joy for all the senses. What lovelier sight is there than that double row of white cigarettes, lined up like soldiers on parade and wrapped in silver paper? I love to touch the pack in my pocket, open it, savor the feel of the cigarette between my fingers, the paper on my lips, the taste of tobacco on my tongue. I love to watch the flame spurt up, love to watch it come closer and closer, filling me with its warmth.” luis bunuel
Model Smoking
Good food, good sex, good digestion, good sleep: to these basic animal pleasures, man has added nothing but the good cigarette. ~Mignon McLaughlin, The Second Neurotic’s Notebook, 1966
I used to smoke two packs a day and I just hate being a nonsmoker…. but I will never consider myself a nonsmoker because I always find smokers the most interesting people at the table. ~Michelle Pfeiffer
“Divine in hookas, glorious in a pipe
When tipp’d with amber, mellow, rich, and ripe;
Like other charmers, wooing the caress
More dazzlingly when daring in full dress;
Yet thy true lovers more admire by far
Thy naked beauties—give me a cigar!”
Lord Byron The Island . Canto ii. Stanza 19.
Penelope Cruz smoking
‘FUCK off.’ Kate Moss responds to an attendant who asked her to extinguish her cigarette at the Mario Testino exhibition at the National Portrait Gallery,
2 February 2002
‘I’VE BEEN doing some sums following the recent medical assertion that every fag you smoke costs you eleven minutes of your life. Let’s take somebody who is aged 100 and has smoked a modest ten a day since the age of 15. That’s 310,250 cigarettes or a total of 3,412,750 minutes of lost time. In more understandable terms, that means this person would have lived an extra six and a half years if he-she hadn’t ever smoked. My question is: would that be much of a bonus?’ Columnist James Whitaker, The Mirror, January 2000
‘OH, I LIKE smoking, I do. I smoke for my health, my mental health. Tobacco gives you little pauses, a rest from life. I don’t suppose anyone smoking a pipe would have road rage, would they?’ Artist David Hockney, Daily Telegraph, July 1999
‘IF I CANNOT smoke in heaven, then I shall not go.’ Mark Twain (1835-1910)
After a truly good meal, an outstanding cigar is still the most satisfying after-dinner activity that doesn’t involve two human beings. ~ Brad Shaw
“If your wife doesn’t like the aroma of your cigar, change your wife.”
Zino Davidoff
Recently, in Paris, some G’s made off with $28.4 million in gems, one of the largest jewelry thefts ever. Four men in balaclavas (ski masks for those unfamiliar with the UK crime scene) entered the Harry Winston boutique near the Champs-Elysees at 10am. The heist men then overwhelmed the six employees arriving for work and had them open the safe (smart move). It was true to “the art” as no one was harmed. Very professional with plenty of dash and style.
Interpol is now claiming that jewelry store robberies are up 20% from 2005 (coincidentally, the year The G Manifesto went online). The hot talk is now is about a “new era” of criminality in the luxury sphere. Every time I hear this, it makes me laugh.
To clue everyone in, there are a few key elements going down in The Underworld.
1) Internationally, the penalties for small heists are very similar as big ones. Anyone with any kind of pedigree is making a move on the big stuff. Being involved in a car stereo thieving cartel doesn’t hold the glamour as it did when we were 13 years old.
2) The Underworld isn’t the same place as it was for our fathers. Drugs changed everything. Too many a snitches and informers. The sons of true old-school G’s are trying to exit stage left out of “The Life” as quickly as possible. Now, what is the easiest way to do that? Exactly, Big Heists.
The Coup – Fat Cats and Bigga Fish
3) The chasm between poor and rich in this world is only growing wider. Believe it or not, most “professional” Heistmen (I am talking the crème de la crème here) have deep concern for the poor, the future of the planet and mankind in general. I personally have never had a problem redistributing some of the world’s wealth. I hate seeing malnourished kids with bloated bellys. Rich beware, there are more poor out there than you. You can thank me and “my kind” from your gated communities, suburban enclaves and lame country clubs that “The Revolution” hasn’t already come.
4) The dollar is so weak now. Every International Playboy/Heistman/G is not going to break his back in the US only to get gouged on exchange rates in Europe. Trust me, the exchange rate can really sting when you are buying some handmade suits on Savile Row, London. Hence, more International high dollar heists.
5) Most importantly, the “tech” crims are making all the long coin these days. Hacking into a banks computer and moving $15,000,000 into a numbered Swiss account is a lot easier than actually going into a bank, Prada suited down with heaters and ski masks. My peers (G’s with ties to the old-school) are feeling like we are getting evolved out. And, truthfully, we are. We are feeling the heat, and we are running for the exit doors of “The Life” as quickly as possible. Of course, the “exit doors” means living the life of a Gentleman of Leisure on some tropical beach with a couple of Latina girlfriends. So, don’t shed a tear for us, Argentinian girl. Either way, that is the main reason for the increase in high dollar heists.
N.W.A. – Appetite For Destruction (listen for Eazy E’s verse)
Right now you are seeing the last generation of true heist men out there. We are about to become extinct not because of police pressure but by technology. This is our last great chance. (Our fathers and grandfathers had it so easy.)
And why not? Most of us are living much better than fine, young, brash, and handsome like Ali in his prime. Sure, we could maybe be “tech” crims or put tech crim crews together (say that ten times fast), but there is nothing quite like being an International Playboy/ Heistman. When was the last time you saw some “hacker guy” with a model on his arm? There will never be another quite like me. Enjoy it while it lasts.
I don’t typically endorse products. Actually, scratch that, I do endorse products; ETRO, Ozwald Boateng, Zippo, Dunhill, Dupont, Ruger, Beretta etc. When it comes to clothing, I do not typically endorse T-shirt companies, I usually endorse High-end Italian suitmakers. But I have recently become aware of a dope urban streetwear line called SKEEEM.
I mentioned them in The South Beach War Report Part I: The Basics when I noticed Pitbull was wearing a dope T-shirt with a ski mask logo in the DJ Khaled, Trick Daddy, Pitbull, Rick Ross video “Born N Raised”.
SKEEEM clothing was born by the fact that individual privacy is not easy to maintain in the 21st Century, in fact nowadays almost every urban street corner has camera surveillance.
There is a unique SKEEEMask hidden in every hoodie en vest. Also this mask is delivered separately with the t-shirts. The mask shows that the wearer of SKEEEM rebels against that part of society that is trying to put a label on age groups or ethnic groups. With a SKEEEMask on, people are forced to judge the inside instead of the outside. Big Brother may be watching, but what does he see? Perfect for a heist.
SKEEEM Clothing is not available yet it the United States. So, if you are a dope Retailer in America, and you are looking for something much, much sicker than your average, feel free to contact them here: http://www.skeeem.com/contact.html or info@skeeem.com .
