The Man Behind Flamingo Estate - Mother Earth's Favorite Child, Richard Christiansen

28:20And everyone has said, and I think you notice it the most. And then you execute that very well. Like the actual simplicity of all of it. Yeah. And also, she's 85. She's fucking 85. And, you know, Davide and myself and her, we all share the same birthday week. And we had dinner a few weeks ago when it was my birthday, just before. Here she came to L.A. for the day. And this is classic Martha. She came for the day. She called me up. She said, I'm in L.A., let's have dinner. She had a 6 a.m. call time. But, yeah, we went to the polo bar. We had dinner. She threw down a few martinis and a steak. And she's up late and she's still, you know, at the club, so to speak.

29:00Incredible. And just, like, sharp as a tack. and we talked, as always, we geeked out over plants and we talked about all the stuff we love and it just like went on and on and on and it was as natural as breathing. I really love her. And it's very easy with me and her and I think because she really appreciates hard work in people. She sees it. She knows I like hard work too. And she knows, I don't think she'd ever ask someone to do something that she doesn't know how to do herself. I've seen that of her. She learns and learns and reads and reads. And so this is why the books are really good for me too because I'm learning so much writing them.

29:33This one particularly was a really interesting learning curve for me. And just like that, she doesn't pretend that she did know how to do everything, but she's learned how to do most things because she's done it. And so I really admire her for that. And, you know, I'd gone home straight after that dinner. My dad is roughly the same age as Martha. Not great with his health, not great with his mental health. there's a difference between an 85-year-old who's functioning at that wildly productive level and someone who's not. And so there's something really special there. And I told Isaac, oh, I feel like I'm getting old.

30:11And she's like, oh my God, you're just getting started, which is nice. We had a great time. I had a cute old man sit next to me at J.G. Mellon the other day and I said, I'll be 40 in November. And he put his hand on me. He said, you're so young. Yes. I would wait to go back to 40. And I thought, oh, that just like invigorated me so much, you know, because there was all those you have all these ideas in your head of like where you're going to be at 40. Like I started to panic a little bit. I was like, I want to do this and I want to do that. And I was like, wait, am I going to be like doing that at 50?

30:40Like, who cares at 50? At 50, it's like you're a jerk. And then I was like, oh, my God, I'm probably going to be like my hottest at 50. You know, like just the way that like everything's just getting better and better and life is getting more and more fun and richer. this all comes down to your garden. Well, no, it doesn't just come down to the garden. It would be impossible to replicate cleanly because it's a real place. We have a real property. It comes down to a real place. We started as a network of 150-something farms. So our supply chain is totally different to everyone else. We're pulling directly from farmers.

31:19Those people that know the Genesis story know like it was all upside down you know most people that start a business say i'm going to make this thing and then they go find the the ingredients or the the people to work with none of that happened we we started helping farmers sell their vegetables and one farm became 10 became 50 became 150 something now how do you manage that many it's a lot of work and so this is what i was talking about going back to like you doing things the hard way but it's interesting because it meant that it's also why we made so many products in the first few years because people will come and say, hey, I've got 10 acres of sage.

31:54What can you make with it? And I'd say, let's make hand soap. How hard could that be? And so trying to really with no experience, figuring it out. This is why the mothor example is important because if you don't know how to do something, you can figure it out and you can become a master at it. And so the ability to sort of like replicate that model now that model is so huge and the supply chain is so vast and the business has got so big the train is well until they left the station I think it will be very hard for someone to come in and try to except for trying to copy the branding or something and I think there is gonna be a great reckoning I think there is these are we call them empty calorie brands these brand these there's a difference between a brand and and selling things or making things.

32:39And I think we have built a brand and in all the multi-dimensions that a brand needs and a real believable thing. And just making a product and selling it is not the same thing. It's why the slop infuriates me. And also why the media lens... That's the other thing I actually talk a little bit about. The media landscape is particularly annoying for me right now because I believe we have a crisis of beauty in the world because the the things I love which are storytelling and photography and fine art and that sort of stuff which I used to learn about as a as a young person through magazines through fashion photography through that sort of stuff that stuff doesn't exist anymore and you know Meta and Google the places that we we advertise by necessity, they continue to tell us that even in our paid media, our stuff is too nice.

33:35It has to be on an iPhone and it needs to be user-generated. And Javi and I are photography nerds. We take a lot of time with what we make. And for me, that's actually the most enjoyable part of what we do. And I think maybe the special part about what we did in the beginning, because I don't think anyone had taken that lens that was previously put onto luxury brands and given it to vegetables. And so it's something we've always been proud of and worked very, very hard at and invested behind. We spend a lot on that sort of stuff. But in any case, we're consistently told that we need to get someone in yoga gear holding up a candle and doing it on an iPhone.

34:19And so I think if you think about If the algorithm is favoring that sort of content, it means you're seeing more of it. It means you're digesting more of it. Where's the beauty in the world? Where do we find it? This happened to me with my clothing brand. When LPA launched, I came from the early 2000s in New York. We were there around the same time. Tim Barber lived across the street from me. Ryan McGinley was on the cover of New York Magazine, shooting Urban Outfitters campaigns. every hot guy in downtown was a studio manager for a fabulous photographer yeah yeah everyone who went on to fuck nate lowman you know it was all and i and i said this to a cute girl that said hi to me outside of saint embers the other day i said are where are all the hot guy artists and photographers like that those were the hot guys downtown that were creating and part of their complete and total attraction was that they were creating images and shaping the landscape in that way.

35:14And so when I launched LPA, I had a very, I wanted to, you know, I was like, oh, I want to work with Casper and I want to use this person. And it was like, totally. And I fought so hard and I casted models that now are all huge. I kind of catch Gabriette before she was, you know, and everyone thought she was too. And I've been repeatedly told and I get it because it comes down to money. And, but you know, every year my budget gets cut a little bit more and it's like, just give it to a cute girl with an iPhone. And, and so then I said, but then what brand do I have? Yeah, yeah. You know what I mean?

35:44And it's a real thing. We talk about it a lot. There's no brand. We're not going to buckle. We're not going to do that. And we'll continue to, you know, put our head down and do it our way. But it's interesting. I think about that a lot. And the thing is also the home. This is why the books are important to me, too. The home for that kind of layered deep thinking and storytelling. It's not on a phone anyway. It doesn't exist anywhere else. We can't get it in a magazine. And even like today's podcast by many people will be seen as a 10-second cut down on an Instagram reel of, you know, the cut down of the cut down of the cut down.

36:18And so these like, you know, tiny bite-sized, you know, pieces of information are not enough to sustain all the storytelling we want to do. So it's why, you know, it's why the books are all very important to me. And I work so hard on them. They're beautiful. And I want to also just acknowledge, like, you are, as much as you're a master of the garden, like, from a business perspective, like, the things that you don't talk about all the time that are so hard. You deserve the world for how quick thinking you are and the navigating of the investors. Well, we've talked about the investor thing a lot.

36:57Yes, that stuff. I know. It's because it's what kills you. And it's fucking hard. And that's, people don't understand. Like people think that Davide has like a fucking fuck all brand that doesn't do, you know, that he's just like whittling his thumbs all day long. And I'm like, no, I know he's he's I know we've had so many guys, too. Right. Everyone's like, oh, they're just in their garden and they're making art online. And no, I saw this funny Instagram reel. This girl's like, quit your job and you two can have a flamingo estate in six months. And I was like, bitch, if you knew how many years I practiced to get there and then how many years it took me to like get investors and how many times we ran out of money and how many times we were like so close to shutting down.

37:33This like constant, as you know, with David, we talked about the investor thing so often and the financial cash flow and all this stuff. It's a lot. You know, it's the same argument where I'll be like, we need to do more and we need to run ads. And he's like this and he's like with time. He's like, I'm building something that needs to sustain all of these things. And you do the same thing. But that is like courage right there to say we're going to take our own time and do it our own way. It's why Hermes is Hermes. This is a there's very few legacy brands that say we're going to do it our own way and take our time.

38:02That's been the biggest interesting thing in our relationship is that. And you guys do it so well. But what you also do very well is your distribution and that man that fucking like every corner of the world that I am in. There is a Flamingo Estate candle for sale. And this comes down to me being in Carmel at a private on a private property. What's that place? I can't even remember where it is. friends of ours have are members of this private thing on these like acres in carmel where there's like horses in a lake and a golf course and in the gift shop is fucking flamingo but you know that and you say that but that does not come easy and you know that's what i'm telling you it's so hard i told you tomorrow i start a 52 city book tour and the 52 cities and the and really the grunt work of that tour is obviously i want to meet people and i want to like talk about the book But also, like, I want to go to the little corners of America and, like, talk about candles or whatever the thing is to, you know, I'm going to like very, very country Maine tomorrow.

39:10It's the first stop is Maine. I saw that. I love that you're going from here to Maine. I love it. It's so beautiful. And so this little town in Maine, you know, where I know there's a pocket of customers that love what we're doing and I want to meet them. And so, you know, there's no way to fake that. That's just like, that is the work of the work. That is the grunt work of building a brand. Yeah, so that's why I brought it up because I was like, people really don't understand the way that your distribution is and the way the places that people find you are very hard to get to. And someone on your team and you and a bunch of people have had endless conversations about making sure that, by the way, distribution is so hard.

39:50It's so hard. Getting the candles somewhere, the production is so hard. I'm on an Amtrak tomorrow for three hours. Fucking chipped is so fucking hard. Like, you make it all look so easy. Well, that's sweet. And it's not, I know. But you do. Well, we love it. We want to do well. We really do. We're impatient. We want to do well. And so... I mean, how many countries does it sell in? We're in the States. We're in Australia. We're in Japan, New Zealand. And we're pulled back out of Europe. We want to wait until we really can, you know, really figure it out before we go there. That's a whole other hard thing to fucking figure.

40:23No, everyone's like, oh, you've got to, you know, go. Everyone's like, there's no reason why not. Investors want that too. Go to China, go to Korea, go, you know. And I was like, nope, we are going to, we're going to do it slow and steady. And we haven't, we still have so much runway in America and Australia and all those places. And Japan, we barely scratched the surface of it. That's going to be an exception. It's already been great there. But, you know, so that's enough.

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44:54it's nice to know how much is enough as well you know also people don't understand if you stretch yourself too thin then a lot of things happen your products aren't as good your customer service isn't as good you're not able to ship and guess who gets so pissed when nothing is perfect your fucking customer well also i think the day you start taking the day you take money from someone is the day that you are asked to start making concessions because you need more margin. You need to make more money. And that's the way investors work. You know, they want to make money. I want to make them money too.

45:22And they want to make it quick and they want to do it. Right. And so this is the tension, right? It's like, how do we never buckle in terms of what we want to do in terms of margins or ingredients or how we make things or the cost? We're very expensive, brand, to make. Someone said, one of the investors actually said in a board meeting that most brands like us are running on like a Tesla engine. We're running on a Bentley engine. You know, it's like so expensive. There's so many people involved. The supply chain is so, so enormous. I cannot imagine the systems that you even have set up. And we have our own warehouse.

45:56We don't outsource that stuff. Your warehouse to like someone in the office, to talking to a farmer, to making sure that the products arrive on time, to get to wherever they're made. And you personalize so much. Yeah, hundreds and hundreds of thousands of boxes. And you still run the Instagram. I do. Yeah, yeah, I do for now. Please, always. I have to because I think, we've said this before, I feel like the, I have shared this story. I was at a conference years ago on the, checking it at the front desk and this old man was there who was clearly the CEO of a big company. And this young colleague came up to him who was like, oh, I want you to meet Sally.

46:35She's the new social media. She's going to run out social media. and walks this like 20-year-old college graduate and she's going to run all of the social. And I wanted to shake him really hard and be like, you fool. This is the biggest window to what you're doing and you're letting the most inexperienced person in your company run it. You should be running it. You are in the hot seat. You are the quarterback. You should be the one doing it. And so I will never give that up and still write the emails and write all this stuff. And Harvey does all the design work. We're really like art. pretty good duo.

47:09Yeah. Well, you started it, obviously, before you met Harvey. All just at the same time. Yeah, yeah. COVID. Yeah, yeah. First week of COVID. Well, I knew who you were and what you were doing. And then when he said, I'm dating somebody, I was like, wait, who the fuck are you dating? This is so exciting. And he said it was you. And I literally said, selfishly, this is so good for me. I'm dying to see Flamingo's date. It's so close to my house. Someone had had like a party there that I saw on Instagram and I was like, I'm going to die if I don't go there. like I will lose my fucking mind and watching the two of you as a couple fall in love, love each other so much integrate your family so well with each other and then but really like creatively because Harvey used to do you know when I could hire him to do freelance but we wouldn't, I don't give him enough credit he designed my dad's funeral pamphlet no he's the best designer he's the best designer he designed our barrancini tag yeah yeah yeah I remember I was very jealous he's so talented The brand would not be where it is without him.

48:08I mean, that's so honestly. Like, we would never, ever be where we are without both of us. But really, he really elevates it. He likes to joke that I'd be selling, you know, vegetables. Like the farmer's market? I'd be selling potatoes at the farmer's market every Wednesday if I hadn't have met him, which may be true. But you are also, there's a lot of truths that are true for Richard, which is that right now you look like a hot farmer in your, you know, you have your neutral garden tones on. And I love when you wear this because I do feel like this is armor for you just as much as your fucking suits.

48:43And did you not make a plain suit when you traveled? I knew you were going to ask me about this. So, you know, I'm not a clothes person. I never have been. But you are. But I have this uniform I wear every day. I wear a green T-shirt and my pants and my work boots. But when I do, apart from that, you know, the only other thing I wear is suits. And I have a small collection of them, a couple from Europe. I have a tailor in Hong Kong that my dad used to take me to when I was a kid. Not because my dad was wealthy or indulgent, but because he was very cheap. And he would get our school uniforms made from this guy.

49:18When my mom and dad were selling their honey in Hong Kong, we would go there when we went to the food show to get my stuff made. The man still makes my suits today. And, you know, wonderful to have that kind of thing. He must be so happy to see you every time you go. The suit guy? Yeah. I mean, he's always telling me I've got a little bit bigger here or something. Yeah, perfect. He's great. Anyway, so the suit that you're talking about, that I know you're going to ask me about. This is actually, I was finishing my next book, not this one. And the next book is about hospitality. Okay. Which I'm so excited about too.

49:57And about. Because we've all lost a lot of that. I can talk about that for fucking ever. That needs to be another whole episode because hospitality is, and I want Harvey and Davide in here on that conversation. It's an endangered art form. Yes. And I really wanted to write and research a lot about it and think about it. And I had written that book also when my dog was passing away. And that really like softened my heart a lot. and was in and out of hospitals with him all the time. Learned in that process that the word hospitality and the word hospital and the word hospice and the word hotel come from the same root word.

50:35Which is what? Hospice, which means it means to care for someone, but in a two-way conversation. The idea that service is not servitude, that I can wait on you and be at your level and be just as kind to you as you are in return to me because we both show each other how we want to be treated. And so when you think about Davide's favorite, think about Davide's Italian restaurants he loves and Italian hospitality of the warmest in the world is this idea of a two-way conversation. And we have run away from that in America. We've abandoned that idea. And so I... What a perfect place to write the book at El Pelican.

51:20It wasn't bad, yes. No, but because you were experiencing it firsthand while you were there. No, I was there. El Pelicano, as many of your listeners know, is one of the most beautiful hotels in the world. My friend Mari Luiz owns it. It's in Italy. We went there for me to finish riding it. Sorry, back to the suit. I made a suit for that trip that doesn't crinkle because my suit's mainly linen. I wanted a suit that was not going to crease because I wear a suit on a plane. If I get on a plane, I dress up. We dress up every time we... And I do that not for any other reason, but to say to the person who's there, you know, serving me a meal or getting me somewhere safely that I see you and I'm really respect what you're doing.

51:59This idea that hospitality is a two way street. You can see how I want to be treated by the way I'm going to treat you back. So I tip very well. I dress up and I always say thank you. I'm always like trying really hard to like make sure that if I'm in that service environment that I am, it's not servitude. I feel so strongly about this idea. And when you read the greats in hospitality, when you read about Giuseppe Cipriani, when you read about these people who have really conquered hospitality, they all came in it from this idea of like, I am there to make you feel as good as you are there to make me feel good.

52:39So work is not But a chore, work is a joy. And whether that's a hospital or a hotel, the same rule applies. And so when I think about our broken health care system here and the broken airline industry and the broken hotel industry and these places where real hospitality has evaporated, that got me really curious for the next. Because, you know, I love hospitality, as you know. I love a party. I love a dinner. More than anything. I love everyone to feel really. And you really live that. You send personal presents and you send personal notes and you carry back a fucking ashtray for Davide from Italy.

53:13Like you are an example. You live it. I believe we are. Flamingo Estate is a hospital. Even though we don't sell rooms and we don't have a restaurant, we are a hospitality brand. And we feel that same way about Giaia and we feel that same way, hopefully, about Berencini. We are in the hospitality industry because we are about making people feel warm and loved. Loved and seen. And so that is always. And I think in different ways. We've always said what we make are tools for a happy life. And I really mean that. Like this is just like honest things done well because we also want good stuff. What are some of the tools in Pleasure Principles that you lay out that you think are?

53:53Well, it's more like the book is such a complicated book. It's divided into 12 months. Every month has a garden that we talk about. I just planted 12 new gardens. So the team and I did at the estate, a sage garden, a rose garden, a camellia garden. My mom and I have been saying like, it's time to plant a sage. It's too hot outside. No, we did a lot of work in the garden to just like create new gardens, flatten the hillside. Like really, we've worked on this idea of gardens, like the sage garden, it's a new garden. There are 200 species of sage in the world. I think 20 of them, something are native to California.

54:31I want all of them. I want a full sage collection. So things like that that I geek out over. So anyway, we talk about the gardens, and then I deep dive into really interesting stories about plants or ingredients. And so many things I learned about mandrake is a really interesting plant. And it's largely used in sort of ointments in the dark ages. It's almost like it was a recreational drug. It would give you the sense of weightlessness if you were to eat it. And that became the trope for the witch and the broom, because if a woman was caught with mandrake in her hands, she'd be burned as a witch.

55:11And so this idea of a witch flying on a broom, the broom is the mandrake branch, and the flying is the sensation that you get from eating the herb. And so that's in the witchcraft chapter. And it's a really interesting... That's so beautiful. And then other things like, you know, the things that, you know, I said the other day, this is also a business book disguised as a gardening book, because you think about the citrus industry in California came from two plants that were given to Eliza Tibbetts here in Los Angeles, who basically every citrus tree after that is a byproduct of these two trees.

55:49And it birthed the whole, we wouldn't have Orange County without this woman. And then the citrus industry marketing this idea of California to the people on the East Coast who are called during December saying, come West, buy property, invest here on the back of sort of this glow of citrus. And sort of the marketing mechanics of that I found very interesting. the same for, there's a chapter on eucalyptus and eucalyptus was brought here from Australia. Really is a propaganda machine to get people to move here because the gold rush had done a lot of building, everyone was running out of wood. This idea that eucalyptus was like an instant forest, it would grow quickly.

56:31And it was sort of a big marketing ploy from the railway companies really to get people to come here. So fascinating stories about people that have, individual people who have really worked their asses off to create things as generic as an orange, that we take for granted today. Orange Grove in Pasadena, too, with that whole thing. Yeah, and that whole area where we both lived was once upon a time part of a giant estate that was all citrus trees. And so now it's Pasadena and Island Park and Eagle Rock. And so when you really understood, it's also nice for me to know where we were. It's beautiful to know where we came from and how these things developed.

57:11Yeah. You have an entire, it's a packed city now because of this. You know that you and I are going to die and your citrus trees will be long live you. I love our citrus trees. And your garden will. And this idea of a ticking, it gave me the idea of a ticking clock, but also a timelessness that comes from a garden. You can't rush. And so, you know, the trees, it's hot right now. The trees will drop their leaves in a few months and then everything will sleep. And there's this consistency that I find comforting in a time when the world's gone crazy, that you know this will pass. This will move and a new season will come.

57:48It always has. And so there's a real knowing and a real certainty in some of those stories of plants that sort of pop the balloon of anxiety for me. because you know that those citrus trees in my garden, the eucalyptus trees in my garden are 120 years old and they have seen much worse times, you know? And so I find that very interesting. And then also, sorry, every month there's a collection of things to do from like make bird seed to make a lasagna to, you know, make your own brooms. So it is though, my question was, what are some tools? This entire thing is literally just a fucking toolbox of how to live and integrate your life into the garden and then how to enjoy, you know, you're bringing all the pleasures.

58:38You keep it next to the toilet and you can pick it up and be like, okay, it's September. What am I going to do? Here's three things. I'm going to make bird seed. I'm going to save my seeds. I'm going to make a jasmine mist, whatever. Amazing. And so all that stuff that I also feel like there's a difference between seeing this on Instagram and actually, actually doing it. And so these are not complicated things. They're not difficult things. Harvey was talking yesterday about how much he loved the back page of Martha Stewart's magazine, where it'd be like things to do every month. And he's like, where do we get that now?

59:12And I was like, the answer is in this book and other books. But I want this to be a workbook for happiness. Your farm boxes feel that way, but obviously those are so localized. So what a dream to be able to give this to everybody. because those farm boxes are like an active toolbox, right? Because you're given all of these incredible... Such a wild, wild thing. And, you know, those vegetable boxes. Recently, this last year or so, breathed new life into that program with, you mentioned Gabriette. I know. Every week, someone curates that she did one a few weeks back. I know Harvey said that one was just like explosive.

59:49Oh my God. Echoed around the world. People everywhere. Well, people also forget, she got like famous on Instagram from cooking. And then she stopped. So I love that that was like a full circle moment to remind her people of where she has such a passion for food. Some of the greatest chefs in the world have now done a phone box and that Gabriette was the number one. But this is where I'm saying, like, for you guys, you are combining all of these things that actually work, right? Where you're like, we don't want to, you know, we... I think that the one thing that we've done, maybe Gabriette's the best example of it.

1:00:25and we keep trying to do this, is how do we collide culture and horticulture? Yes, that's what I'm saying. So for as much as you don't want to, if you want to be offline and get back to the, you are really doing things that are so current with what's happening culturally and very significant. And it started with LeBron James' Honey and then, you know, Kelly Wurstler and then like the, you know. Chrissy Teigen. Chrissy Teigen and Sesame Street. And, oh my God, there's been so many now. There's been so many. I know. Do you know the one actually, it's appropriate we talk about this, the one that got away that I really regret, it's the only one I regret that did happen, was the project we started to talk about doing with Dolly Parton.

1:01:03And the idea that we had, that she liked, Oh, I want to cry. was arrange a coffee called 8 to 6 as a reference for 9 to 5. Of course. And because no one gets to work at 9 anymore, everyone's going in earlier, I hope. Anyway, so 8 to 6 was this idea for coffee. And we had some conversations about it. We had talked about distribution for it and had some different sort of distribution partners plugged in for it. I think in fairness, it was probably a tad too young at that point as a business to shoulder someone with that much fame because the volume was going to be so big. And then sort of agents and things got in the way and it kind of fell apart.

1:01:43But that would have been the dream. And it's so interesting with all the others, all of the others, Pamela Anderson's Pickles, like all the others that we've done. it's never come from an agent it's always come directly from the person or from someone that they're close with who said I like what you're doing can we work with you it's never ever come from an agent because all the money goes to every cent goes to charity for all of that stuff all the time every single penny goes to charity and so whether it was Jane Goodall or whoever it was it was always like a sort of we like what you're doing let's have a talk about it that speaks volumes of you Richard and Harvey too, right?

1:02:22Like think about the people that you are around and how adored and loved you are. We don't take that lightly. But that comes back to you being a host and you being hospitable and people really feeling that from you because when people meet you and they see what you're doing in your home and that you're host and everything is so personal and sweet, it's so genuine. But everybody and everybody wants to be a part of it because you are at the end of the day like doing what we all want to be a part of, which is like creating fucking community. Yeah. And doing fun things. We're having fun, which is the most important part.

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1:06:38How do you balance, like, you're going on a 50 to... City tour. City tour. So how are you feeling about this? And how are you going to, you know, what are your practices that you do? Because you are incredibly fucking busy all the time. You're running a huge multimillion dollar business, right? And you have, you know, you're in love and you have deadlines and you somehow write the beautiful fucking pamphlet that comes in your box every Friday. And it's so current that also blows my mind. Like if I get a box, you're like, well, I'm just leaving Italy right now. And I'm like, yeah, he literally like, did you write this yesterday?

1:07:17Yeah, I got to write it tonight for Friday and the sub stack. They're always on a regular, you know, two days out timeline. So what is like a, you know, I'd love to know kind of like your flow of getting things done, managing projects, managing people, and then managing your life in a way that like you aren't really getting spun out because you are a very grounded, centered person. I don't do a lot. And I think a lot of it's about saying no to things. You know, we really don't waste our time. We don't I don't go out to things I don't want to do. I'm very rarely go out. I support my friends and I'll show up for them, but I won't.

1:07:52I don't waste time. I think, and very honestly, like the one thing I do for myself is I go to the gym every morning. I was just about to say you go to the gym every morning. And you ride your bike there, by the way. And I ride my bicycle. I don't have a car. He doesn't know how to drive. I don't know how to drive. And so I think I get a lot of work done mentally because I'm on my bicycle. And I dictate everything to myself. And I get it all sort of out of my head before most people have got to the office. You dictate it into your phone or you're just doing this in your head? Mm-hmm, in my phone.

1:08:18So a lot of that writing is done by dictation. Okay. And then I do a lot of dictation too. A lot of the books were written. It's like, you know, things I thought of when I was riding through Pasadena near your house. That's amazing. And so there's that. And then I take a long bath. I try to do every day. Are you in that bathhouse every day? Morning or night? Morning or night? No, I'm too busy in the morning. Normally nighttime. But that's like the one thing I do. And then everything else is pretty standard, you know. I don't think there's any shortcuts. We just got to head down and I'm working.

1:08:50But we've got it flow now. We know what it's doing. I think the, yeah, I don't know. It just, it flows. It flows. And obviously, like sometimes busier than us. Christmas is going to be crazy this year as we get ready for that. So what we did this year, which we had never done as we took a summer vacation. We haven't done that properly in a long time. And time off is as important as time on. So I think that that. But you also wrote an entire book on your vacation. I can't sit still. So that was. I can't either. Harvey had no problem sitting still. I don't tell I can't over two weeks. And then. You also traveled besides your airplane suit.

1:09:26Yeah. You also brought your Mac. I brought my large desktop computer and I felt so embarrassed traveling. I wanted a big computer to work with and I felt embarrassed. We got to the hotel and Mary Louise, who owns the hotel, I felt so bad that the staff were carrying this giant box up this very, very, very long stairway up to the room that we're in on the hill. and she said no no the person that's coming off to you comes here every year for several weeks and she brings an upright piano and they carry it up those stairs for her and so that is hospitality so don't worry about the desktop computer you need to worry about the upright piano and so yeah i did but but desktop computers this is very funny i i bought one six months ago and i went to the apple store.

1:10:15What color did you get? Just plain silver. Okay. I got the green one. Yeah. Yeah. Well, of course. I just got plain silver cause it's in my bedroom. My office, you know, I have this like beautiful romantic desk in my bedroom and you'll like this, the saleswoman, I said, you know, I think it's time. I was like, I really need like a desktop and my laptop feels too, it's not giving me enough. Like I really want to be at my desk, you know, it's too mobile. Like I really, and she like put her hand on me and it was we could analyze we could write like a dissertation about this she put her hand on me and she says a desktop computer is very grounding someone give that apple employee i said you fucking smart bitch yeah she needs a job at the flamingo state what is less grounding than a fucking computer but 100 nothing has grounded me more and made me have more of a ritual and made inspired me to work more than sitting at my desktop computer.

1:11:11I light my flamingo steak handle, I open my windows, I put my music on. There's a, so, like, and I saw your beautiful photos of it, like, outside. Like, I, what a joy. Like, I would love, I would be so much more inspired to write if I had something that felt that concrete. Because it does, it inspires you to work a little bit more. You know, we got the train from Rome to Venice. Did Harvey tell you this? My luggage was stolen on the train. Those Italians, they really know what they're doing. I was very impressed with how quick they did it. But, you know. They'll take a watch off with your hands out the window for a second.

1:11:46I was so impressed with their work ethic. My suitcase, his suitcase, which are identical, and my giant computer box. And, you know, in the little luggage thing at the end of the train carriage. And they, anyway, they stole my, you know, my J. Crew pants and t-shirt suitcase. Had they have stolen Harvey's. Wow. You know why he didn't hear about this? because it was yours and not his. You know, those thieves opened that suitcase and like, they've got his. not even any pleats in his pants. No, no, no pleats here. But they take your computer? No, no, no, they got that. But actually, the moral of that story was things were much easier with less stuff.

1:12:34I actually was much happier. I was wearing my plane suit on the train and the rest of the vacation was a breeze. I was like, oh, this is great. And loved, we had such good food. I used to live in Italy. I lived in Treviso, just near Venice. And so going back to Venice as an adult, when I was there in my 20s, I couldn't afford to do anything. So to go there and go in the front door and go to Cipriani and stay in a nice hotel and do all the things I sort of watched from afar when I was 21 was amazing. And really restored my faith in hospitality, actually. Actually, and then at Cipriani in Venice, the maitre d' who was very well dressed in their double-breasted suits, it's sort of a different version of Cipriani than we have here, to be honest.

1:13:20He said, he liked it that I was also wearing a double-breasted suit. And everyone in that room in Venice, we went there, the last night we were there, it was late. I think the opera had just been on. It was full of Venetians. The tourists had left. It was full of Venetians who were very well dressed. And he said, oh, you know, we'd eat in there like almost every day. And he's like, you know, you dressed up every day. And I said, yes, I do. And he said, I like that because we are ladies and gentlemen serving ladies and gentlemen. And I thought, wow, you nailed it. I love that. The manager at Chip Browning Beverly Hills is from Spain and he's gorge and cute and older.

1:14:04and scares the shit out of me in a way that makes me feel like I have to act accordingly. And I love it. The other day, I should read the book from Giuseppe Cipriani because he talks about the tables that Cipriani are lower because he wanted everyone to have their feet flat to the floor so that they weren't hunching or having their elbows on the table. Everything's a tiny couple of inches lower than everywhere else. The tablecloth colors to reflect in your face so that you don't look sickly. It'll never have a yellow tablecloth for something like that. It'll always be a crisp color. No flowers, no candles, nothing to distract from the food.

1:14:38If someone comes in for a table and there's like four people want a table and there's also one single person, he'll always give the table to the one person eating on their own because it will mean more to him than with a group. There's some real honest things about the original vision for that restaurant. You know why Harry's Bar is called Harry's Bar? I mean, isn't it an amazing story? I knew talent. Because the owner of the bar, sorry, Mr. Cipriani needed money. This guy kept coming in every night. Yes, yes, yes, yes. This guy kept going in every night. Yeah. He was visiting Venice for some sort of reason.

1:15:18Yes, yes, yes, yes. And this was obviously a very long time ago. We couldn't go to ATMs. There was no banks. Things had to be, you know, we had to call America on a landline. You had to get an operator. You had to money, moving money around was difficult. And this man named Harry was eating every night. But he something happened out of his control where he had to stay in Venice for an extended period of time. And he ran out of money and he kept saying, put it on my tab, put it on my tab. And at the end of this, like maybe I mean, it was at least a month. I remember it could have been more. They said, here's your your tab.

1:15:52And it was a fucking shit ton of money. He said, I'm so sorry. I don't have it. I promise you I'm going to bring it back to you. And they said, OK, whatever. Like this. We got to charge it to the game. This guy's never going to come back and whatever. And he came back years later, however long later, with interest as a thank you and brought them like a duffel bag of money. And so they opened Harry's bar and named it after him. They opened the bar with the money. Yeah, yeah, exactly. And it was the best story of we're on the same level. Yeah, it's a great story. I do love that story. Isn't it just?

1:16:22Yeah. And, you know, there's an interesting hotel just opened in Venice called the Arles. Amazing, amazing hotel. There's an interesting interview with the CEO and how VCs have ruined the hospitality industry. And this idea of these two really contradictory things around short-term gains versus long-term legacy and hospitality. It's a very interesting tension. And it's the reason we wanted to go there and see it. And yeah, I'm really flying my hospitality flag right now. I'm on a rampage. Would you ever open a hotel? I don't think so. I don't think so. I think, well, not certainly a Flamingo hotel.

1:17:05I think there's something special about knowing your lane and what we do is private and it's at home. I don't think we want to commercialize it that much. No, I don't. A restaurant, yes. I mean, I'm sure a million people have asked you to open. We've been asked, but I don't know. I think it's a different skill set. I don't want to be asked. We have been asked by an investor, by money people to do it. It's the wrong entry point. I think if we found a beautiful building and there was some great thing, like, oh my God, yes, but it's got to come from a different place. But, you know, it's interesting, but scale is the enemy of intimacy.

1:17:37And those things need to scale fast. And we are about intimacy at its core. And those things are really important. And back to the AI conversation, you know, I'm not afraid of AI. And yes, we use it. And there's lots of good things about it. But what I'm afraid of is that, and it's the same for all technology, is the promise of this is a waste that it will give us more time to do the things we love. But in reality, what it does is give us more time just to endlessly scroll. And so we don't find ourselves doing more of those things. We find ourselves doing less of them. And it's not so much that the AI is the problem for me.

1:18:10It's sort of like how it ends up affecting our idle time. And, you know, there's a great interview in one of my earlier books, The Guide to Becoming Alive, with David Leon, one of my favorite interviews, who's the co-founder of Farmer's Footprint and a big hero of mine. He says, not that speed is the enemy of intimacy, but that speed is the enemy of ceremony. And what we need, what we crave is ceremony. It's why we set a table. It's why we get married. It's why we go to church. There are ceremonies we need just for our own rhythm of being human that we have completely turned our back on. We eat dinner in front of the television.

1:18:49We don't sit at a table. We eat lunch in front of our computer. We've lost a lot of this everyday ceremony, running a bath, making a dinner that's not in a microwave. These things, again, shortcuts equal short change. This idea that nothing good can ever happen if it's done fast. I think that's, to me, the fast food, fast fashion, fast information is all the same. And so for me, that's the thing that I query and question, is the hungry ghost and fake profit that is speed. What do you and Harvey do for dinner? We don't have a microwave. So whatever we do is slow. Unless it's Popeye's. Unless it's Popeye's.

1:19:35No, it's not very. When I'm home, it's not Popeye's. As I embark on a 52-city tour, maybe Popeye's. It's going to be a lot of Popeye's, babe. He loves Popeye's and pizza. Yeah, no, but we have such an abundance of vegetables. We're so lucky. And a big vegetable garden. Do you guys sit down and eat together every night as much as you can? Yeah, yeah, we do. I mean, maybe it's not as much as we should, but we try to. If I'm making dinner, I always keep in over to our little kitchen. I'll set a table. That dinner we had so long ago where we sat in the kitchen. It was Stephen Galloway. And Davide made pasta, and we all sat in our tiny kitchen.

1:20:04I think about that dinner all the time. It was the nicest dinner I've had in so long. I haven't seen Steven since then, but he and I interact on Instagram all the time. And watching his, he's what a magnificent man. Yeah. It was a fun night that night. It was so simple. So simple and human and fun. And that's what I hope this book and everything we're trying to do gets back to that. Really back to it. Grand gestures don't need to be grand. You know, they can be gestures. Just great, simple gestures. And so, yeah. Well, I'm really proud of you and I'm happy. I'm proud of you too. Here we are again a few years later.

1:20:36still in it where are you most excited to go on this tour hmm what a good question is this gonna because it's 50 basically every weekend from now to Christmas almost six months are we going is he meeting you in certain places he's probably gonna come to he'll come to New York for sure Martha Stewart's gonna do a big big ticketed event when is that it's the 17th I think of September we've got the Y 92nd Street Y big stage so Martha's gonna interview me there which I'm excited about the I'm excited to go to New Zealand I haven't been to New Zealand properly, and I'm really excited to go there. It looks like a fairy tale.

1:21:10In Australia, it's going to be fun, as always, my hometown, my home country, which will be good. And then, like, you know, this weekend, I'm really excited to go to, like, a little town in Maine. And Texas and South Carolina and all these places I haven't really explored. And I want to make sure that what I do to do is, like, I want to find in every location, like, where's the best place to get a sandwich? and where's like the interesting little store and where's the, who's growing good stuff and what about the farmer's market? And I really want to be really an active participant in this tour because what a luxury to be able to go to all these places.

1:21:43And so I don't want to phone it in. I really want to be very curious. I think there may be a book, another book brewing. I was just saying that sounds like another. Davide has such a romance with America that has given, you grow up and I'm sure you had the same thing like growing up and idolizing America. And I think it's obviously such a tumultuous time to be an American and it feels really odd. And I said to, we were having drinks with someone that works at Ralph Lauren the other night and he brought us one of the stamps that Ralph made as a present. Oh, how beautiful. And a hat. And it's a very patriotic hat.

1:22:16Yeah. It's like an American flag. And there's some sort of tagline under it too. And I said, I'm going to wear this and I refuse to take any slack for wearing an American flag hat that seems patriotic because patriotism can also be very fucking liberal and democratic. And it is fundamentally democratic, right? And so I was like, we can't let them win. Like, we have to love America. And I've really fallen in love with this country through people like you and through people like Davide. We see it with different eyes. You see it with different eyes. And like, we go on so many road trips and we go to so many small towns and like, ultimately, like, people are wonderful.

1:22:53You know, I think, I was asked the other day about this. I think the one of the... The World Cup reignited that too for me, seeing all those videos of people from other countries being here. I was an early, not an early bloomer, but I was like, I had already started multiple businesses in my mid-20s. I was go, go, go. And certainly between now and when I came to America 25 years ago, I was running, you know. And someone asked me about it the other day, a business thing. And I actually, really took me a minute and I actually was like, I actually know the reason that started. was because I didn't have papers.

1:23:28I was always trying to get enough points to get a visa. I was like, I need to get to a certain level to get my O1. I need to get a green card. I need to hustle. And I need to punch so far above my weight to be able to get a visa to stay here. My visa ran out in England when I was there. Then I moved to Italy. My visa ran out there. I kept missing the cutoff because I hadn't done enough to warrant the requirements. And so when I got to New York, I was like, I am not going to let that happen again. I'm going to hustle. And so I think by the time I finally got the visa and I got the green card, I think the workaholicism of me was already so refined because I was so high performing.

1:24:09But it didn't come from a place of ego. It came from a place of like, I want my papers. And so it's really interesting when I think about that coming here as a foreigner, wanting papers, legitimately just wanting to be able to stay here, forced me to become a businessman. The American dream. Yeah, I guess so. Here we are. It is. Dreaming. Which is incredible, you know. Well, I love you so much and thank you. You too. Thank you. It's so good to see you. I really am so grateful for it. And anyone listening from Outback Australia, I will see you there and you will say, I heard you on the Pia Baranchini podcast.

1:24:43Okay, thank you. I love you. All right. Love you lots.

1:24:50and that ladies and gentlemen concludes this week's episode of everything is the best I hope you enjoyed it please rate review subscribe all that stuff maybe leave a comment go ahead and follow me on instagram at pia baroncini and I hope you have a fabulous fabulous rest of your day love you ciao

1:25:17Please note that this episode may contain paid endorsements and advertisements for products and services. Individuals on the show may have a direct or indirect financial interest in products or services referred to in this episode.