New York’s $US140m family feud that’s like Succession – but starring women

This story is part of the Good Weekend October 14 edition.See all 15 stories.

It seemed like a simple solution to a very high-net-worth concern. Shortly after her divorce from the jewellery tycoon Nicola Bulgari in 2005, Anna Bulgari created a trust drawn from the proceeds of her settlement. The Anna Bulgari Family Trust was intended to provide a steadily lucrative income for the couple’s three daughters, Veronica, Ilaria and Natalia, securing her daughters’ independence after her death.

Bulgari is a name so intricately entwined with fine jewellery that it barely needs introduction. Alongside his brothers Paolo and Gianni, Nicola Bulgari had built up the brand from a business begun by his silversmith grandfather, Sotirios, in Greece. Sotirios moved to Rome and opened his first store – changing his name from Voulgaris to Bulgari – in 1884. His company’s creations were coveted by famous names including Grace Kelly and Elizabeth Taylor, who called the boutique on Via Condotti “that nice little shop”. The 1970s were the ­beginning of the epoch of Italian style dominance, when every prominent shopping avenue sparkled with the storefronts of Gucci, Ferragamo and Bulgari.

In 1972, Nicola and Anna had moved their family from Italy to New York with a single aim in mind: expansion. Nicola would later recall, “We were stuffing the jewellery in our suitcases to sell it in suites across America.” Anna, meticulous and sociable, made connections that boosted Bulgari’s profile across the US. Only a few years after arriving in New York, the family opened its gargantuan Fifth Avenue store, Andy Warhol calling it a “museum of contemporary art”.

The Bulgaris were soon established on the Manhattan scene: Anna, a stern, striking presence, Nicola, with his ­patrician shock of hair and watchful blue-grey eyes, and three daughters: attractive, well-educated, popular and heirs to vast wealth. In 2011, when Bulgari was sold in a €3.7 billion deal to French conglomerate LVMH, the fortunes of the family looked blissfully secure.

Today, however, the prospect of a painful and public legal battle hangs over the dynasty. Anna Bulgari died in 2019 and the vast settlement she left is at the centre of a showdown: a case brought by Ilaria, 56, the middle sister, against her elder sibling Veronica, 58, who has overseen the trust. Ilaria claims Veronica has failed in her duties as a trustee and kept information from her, diluting their mother’s wish that the daughters’ portions of the trust should be handled equally. She also alleges that she was forced to cede control of her ­finances to Veronica and her father, now 82. Out of a financial arrangement ­intended to remain confidential, the family matter has grown into a bitter legal conflict, filed in the high-­profile Southern District court in New York as Bulgari v Bulgari.

There are strong echoes of Succession – this time with women in the key roles. The battle shines a light on the convoluted workings of a family who seemed to have it all: the breathtaking jewels, impeccable taste in art and classical music, and a web of property reaching from Milan and Tuscany to New York and the gold-plated enclave of Gstaad in the Swiss Alps.

The clash has moved from money to personal fallouts, unleashing suspicion of Ilaria’s life partner, Jan Boyer. In a counter-suit, Veronica alleges that Ilaria was manipulated into questioning the trust arrangements after their mother’s death and accuses Ilaria and Boyer of “an ongoing conspiracy to extract millions of dollars from her sister and elderly father … misusing domestic and international judicial systems to identify assets of Ilaria’s billionaire father – with a purported view to contesting his will after his death, so they can extract as much of his fortune as possible”.

“I want to do justice to my mother’s intentions and to fight for my fair share.”

Ilaria Bulgari

One summer’s day in Gstaad, the woman at the heart of all this greets me in a pretty garden ­outside a rented chalet. It’s a place where, among the meadows and prize cattle, an international A-list hangs out with phalanxes of household staff, drivers and chefs. At the private airfield, elusive oligarchs and jet-setters come and go, borne on the demanding currents of tax planning that only a large amount of money can buy.

Gstaad has been Ilaria Bulgari’s “refuge” after she quit New York in December 2020. Settling us on sofas slung with soft woollen Bulgari blankets, but also some natty adaptation of Ikea furnishings – hinting at a home set up in a hurry – Ilaria sighs that this is “a ­bizarre situation and not one I wanted at all. But here I am – and I want to do justice to my mother’s intentions and to fight for my fair share.” By turns, she exhibits both confidence and vulnerability. What follows, to be fair about the terms of access, is the narrative told mainly from Ilaria’s side of the family divide.

Her school friend Sarah Kornfeld describes the ­situation as “King Lear-y” in its echoes of a fateful ­division of family spoils. Ilaria rolls her eyes at the comparison. “The thought has occurred,” she says. “Though I’m stating for the record I would never compare my ­sisters to Regan and Goneril. I’m very fond of them, despite everything. You don’t stop loving your family.”

Google the “Bulgari girls” and you get pictures of a glossy trio at openings and benefits: a clan in finery, with dazzling white smiles. Now, at home, more often than not, Ilaria is head down in legal papers, in casual trousers, swags of tawny hair in a scrunchie, limping from a knee ligament that needs an operation she can’t find time to schedule until the legal contest is decided. Two large, fluffy dogs loll around.

She’s finally decided to tell her story for a number of reasons. The first is that suits and counter-suits are flying back and forth in New York with such ferocity that she feels she owes an explanation of why her ­motivations are not, as her sister alleges, the “result of an exploitative scheme”, hatched “to extract wealth” from her father and a “vexatious” and “scorched earth” claim that has already incurred a small fortune in legal fees.

The second is that she is upset – to the point of ­tearfulness – at the way she feels her family’s handling of her settlement and its terms “does not respect the wishes of my mother in any sense or spirit”. She is also alleging that the original trust was poorly administered by her elder sister, and that “distributions” – payouts from it – were withheld or incomplete.

The third reason is the charismatic figure of Jan Boyer, an entrepreneur and former economic adviser to George W. Bush, who arrived in her life in 2018. He has, she reckons, been traduced by her family. “Jan is being described as my ‘boyfriend’, as if I picked him up somewhere on the way. But he is my rock and a wonderful partner with a massive heart. I am close to his daughters [from his first marriage] and we are blessed we found each other at the right time. And in Swiss law, we are treated as married [by virtue of cohabitation].” It’s clear in their domestic setting that the couple dote on each other, finishing each other’s sentences, and have a shared interest in culture.

Anna and Nicola Bulgari in New York, 1991. The family moved there from Italy in 1972.Credit: Getty Images

The dispute, from Ilaria’s perspective, goes like this. In 2020, after her mother’s death, she learnt about the assets of two trusts: one dealing with money; the other with residences and real estate. The liquid assets alone are worth around $US140 million. Some $US40 million has been paid out to each of the sisters since. But, as outlined in court documents, Ilaria alleges Veronica not only withheld information and payments but refused to give her full access to ­financial records, which her lawyers allege contain “irregularities”.

David Boies is the veteran legal titan that Ilaria has brought to the fight, still masterminding landmark cases at the age of 81. He enjoys high-profile scraps so much that he has been a defence attorney for Harvey Weinstein, as well as fixing Virginia Giuffre’s payout from Prince Andrew.

Veronica, meanwhile, has hired the tough-talking defence lawyer Mitchell Karlan, who has punched back with the assertive counter-suit, claiming Ilaria and Boyer have abused the legal process to find out more about her father’s billions, with a view to one day ­challenging his will. They argue that in the convoluted world of inheritance trust law, Ilaria also owes a “fiduciary duty” to her sister and are counter-claiming damages, alleging that the flurry of legal actions undertaken by Ilaria has “depleted the Ilaria trust” irresponsibly.

Summary judgment motions (which give each side one shot at being declared the victor) are scheduled to take place this month. If the judge decides the case is too finely balanced, it will go to full, and expensive, trial as soon as early 2024.

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I’ve known Ilaria on and off for a couple of decades, but hardly started out with a ton of sympathy for heiresses fighting over trust funds. Still, her situation was striking, given the character I knew: an open and ­eclectic woman who, childless herself, has scores of godchildren. She’s a member of the advisory board for the Peggy Guggenheim collection and an ambassador for the Salzburg Festival. She’s also the author of a forthcoming historical novel, The Glassblower’s Daughter, set in 16th century Venice, with strong family echoes. Her style is spontaneous but she also says “sweetie” with iron finality, to conclude a debate.

Today, she comes across as a more settled version of the vivacious blonde woman I first met around 2003. She arrived in London in search of a career in publishing, and soon married a mutual acquaintance, journalist William Cash, son of the Eurosceptic MP Bill Cash. “I ended up in this very Eurosceptic, conservative world, which was ironic as I had been a huge believer in European unity. But it was an experience and I have good memories of it.”

Elizabeth Taylor wears Bulgari in 1963.Credit: Getty Images

There were, however, warning signs. The wedding was delayed after Ilaria’s family required a prenuptial agreement that Cash found onerous. Meeting her ­father Nicola at the engagement celebration, alongside A-listers including Claudia Schiffer and Jemima Khan, I remember an elegant, remote figure, bemused by the bacchanal of a west London party and not markedly enthusiastic.

The marriage was over within a couple of years, but it has resurfaced as a detail in today’s legal arguments over how much knowledge Ilaria had of the trusts in her name. “But to me then it was more like ‘there is something for later’, I knew nothing at all of the detail. I was focused on just getting through the divorce and on with my life.”

It also started to raise questions about ­whether a fatherly desire to protect his daughters could tip into something more controlling. “The family were happier with me in New York; they ­worried a lot about risk after kidnappings in my ­extended family. In the end, who knows? It can be hard to distinguish. And at the same time, my father was very supportive and kind. It can be … a mixture in families.”

The Bulgari clan has been close for much ­longer than it has been at odds. Growing up in upper Manhattan, home was a vast apartment and Ilaria, an artistic child gifted at languages, ­attended Saint Ann’s, a bohemian day school in Brooklyn, fitting in with the US-born girls by ­calling herself “Hils or Hilary”. Anna, the family matriarch, was a philanthropist; struggling with cancer, she not only donated to cancer charities but attended conferences alongside oncologists. “My mother was a very strong role model, with a huge sense of what was right, and very open-minded. She was welcoming to everyone, down to earth,” recalls Ilaria. “She would say to us, ‘I love the fact that my three daughters are so different.’ ”

From left: Veronica, Ilaria and Natalia at a 125th anniversary event for Bulgari in Rome, 2009.Credit: Getty Images

Nicola, meanwhile, would take Ilaria with him to the diamond district to source the best stone and listen to his deal-making. Back then, Bulgari was “a family ­business, in the Italian way – we all felt involved. We would go to amazing dinners and borrow pieces to wear, but the next day, they were locked away again and it would be back to school and homework; it didn’t seem abnormal to us at all.”

Ilaria adored classical music and, from her teenage years, developed a friendship with Luciano Pavarotti. The legendary tenor would dive out of performances at the Met – sometimes still wearing a swashbuckling stage cloak – to join parties with the Bulgari clan. “As a child, I would sit and listen to rehearsals and I was awestruck,” Ilaria says. He called her “Chichi”, and Nicoletta, the late singer’s wife, says, “Ilaria was ­almost like a daughter to him.”

Ilaria read international politics and literature at Sarah Lawrence College, New York; Veronica went to the Courtauld in London, and Natalia, the youngest, stayed in New York. Although two of the daughters worked briefly in the business, none warmed to the prospect.

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In the spring of 2019, the family learnt that Anna’s cancer had spread. Gathered together in Millbrook, their Upstate New York country home, Boyer was there, too. With high-octane credentials, safely divorced, but on good terms with his adult ­daughters, he had impressed even this demanding dynasty. Her mother, Ilaria says, “adored Jan”. After Anna died that autumn, the family marked Christmas in Tuscany and Boyer was invited. At this point, however, recollections ­diverge dramatically.

In 2015, mindful of her health problems, Anna had appointed Veronica as co-trustee of the trust she had set up after her divorce. After her death, Veronica became its sole trustee. The provisions stated that Nicola would have no further influence on the matter. In practice, things would turn out very differently.

Veronica’s case cites her mother’s preference for privacy. She has said her mother did not keep files and preferred verbal arrangements, which Ilaria disputes. “As a woman as bright, informed and savvy as my mother, wouldn’t you make sure that this was sorted? She kept binders full of ­detail of her affairs.”

It was Veronica, Ilaria says, who pressured her to sign a document in haste as the family prepared for her mother’s memorial service, and this led to her being hurried into signing off the probate document for her mother’s will in January 2020. “I was rushed into it and trusting – and I had no legal advice. I should not have been put in that position,” she says now. As well as the trusts, Anna left substantial property, ­jewellery and art assets.

The following month, Ilaria was instructed by ­family – via her father’s close adviser, Gary Gartner – to move a third of the sums held in the original trusts into a new arrangement, the “Newco” trust, citing tax purposes. The two sides were heading for stalemate. Ilaria’s requests for documents about assets from the original trust were, she claims, either refused or ­subject to delays.

A finalised version of Newco differed from the Anna Bulgari Family Trust in a number of ways. A third of whatever remained in Ilaria’s trust after her death would pass to Natalia and Veronica, and later their heirs. The original trust, on the other hand, gave Ilaria sole power to dispose of assets as she deemed fit. And the proposed co-trustee who would have control of how funds were spent was Gartner – who would also have acquired sweeping powers over the trust assets and Ilaria’s participation. The new arrangement also ­contained an alarming clause that would allow Ilaria to be removed from her own trust if a “physician, ­psychologist or ­social worker” deemed her incapable of managing her financial affairs. Veronica’s defence also features ­accusations that her sister historically mismanaged financial ­matters.

“I want to find the truth. I want my fair share, and to respect my mother’s wishes.”

Ilaria Bulgari

Crucially, Ilaria cites in her court filings the agreement in Anna’s original trusts that there should be no interference by the original “grantor” of the funds (Nicola Bulgari), who would “relinquish absolutely and forever all possession and enjoyment of the right to trust property” – or to make decisions about it.

As Ilaria pressed for more detail on the way the ­original trust has been handled – and alleged multiple inconsistencies in the financial reporting – personal relations deteriorated. Her monthly living allowance of about $US100,000 was cut off, as was access to the family-owned apartment she inhabited in New York.

A family gathering to distribute Anna’s jewellery ended badly, when Ilaria felt that Veronica had constrained the choice of pieces she could select and, she alleges, refused to give her more details of the ­inventory. “It could have been a unifying experience but it wasn’t at all,” she says. Having originally kept out of the fray, 54-year-old Natalia is now cited by sources familiar with the matter as aligned with Veronica’s defence.

The bitterness over Boyer’s role is, to the outside eye, hard to fathom. On a brief acquaintance in Gstaad and London, I found Boyer intense, energetic and at times a tad full-on in his attention to detail – but that’s hardly uncommon for someone with a professional interest in finance and complex contracts. The defence’s argument is that he is seeking to enrich himself by his ­association with Ilaria and that he is pulling the strings of the legal action – which she strongly denies: “I can think for myself.”

Boies, the lawyer, says: “Ilaria is the strong-minded daughter of a strong-minded mother.” Further, Boyer is already substantially wealthy. He’s loyal but also wry about the delights of life with an heiress: when Ilaria tells me she’s not keen on shopping, despite an impressive collection of Jimmy Choos now housed in adapted Ikea shelving, he quips, “God knows what the results would be if you did get to be good at it.” In short, they seem pretty much an affectionate couple with a healthy respect for each other’s independence.

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In June last year, marking her father’s birthday, Ilaria wrote him a soul-baring letter. She cites his ­desire to see her more self-reliant as a key reason she wanted to understand the financial settlement and ­describes his place in her life as “a rock, a lighthouse showing the way”.

Nicola, for his part, has not commented on the case, other than in a letter expressing his disappointment at Ilaria’s conduct in bringing it. He is, as one business associate puts it, “a rich man, but also restless”. Earlier this year, he was found guilty of insider trading via Tara, an asset management company he set up and through which he bought LVMH shares in 2016, and received a nine-month suspended prison sentence and a hefty fine. “I am 82 years old, I have very little ­memory,” he told the French inquiry. A source familiar with the matter says, “Nicola is very respected for what he has built. But is he happy? Not necessarily. Things weigh on him.”

“This lawsuit is without merit.”

A spokesperson for Veronica Bulgari

The American scribe H. L. Mencken summarised New York priorities, “If someone says it’s not about the money, it’s about the money.” But this time, it is also about loss, memory, differing views of duty and the ­intentions of a matriarch who wanted to look out for her very different and equally beloved girls. Boies says that for all the cut and thrust of a potential courtroom showdown, he is mindful that “in a case like this, people are plaintiff and defendant for a relatively short while, but sisters and a daughter for the rest of their lives”. Bulgari v Bulgari has put that to the test.

When I contact Veronica for comment, a spokes­person gives this statement: “Under Veronica’s stewardship, the assets of the trust have grown exponentially and have been distributed equally among the three sisters. Ilaria has already received $US40 million from her family trust and has not filed any objection to the exhaustive accounting information Veronica has provided, detailing over 15 years of the trust’s investment history. This lawsuit is without merit, and we will ­defend against Ilaria’s claims.“

Ilaria says, “I want to find the truth. I want my fair share, and to respect my mother’s wishes.”

I wonder if she imagines the family will ever spend idyllic ­summers in Italy together, the girls in neighbouring summer houses.

Brown eyes fill with tears. “Maybe one day. But this has to be put right first.”

This is an edited version of a story that first appeared in the Telegraph Magazine, London. © Anne McEvoy / Telegraph Media Group Limited 2023

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