Laura Brown Transcript
Kerry Diamond:
Hi, everyone. You're listening to Radio Cherry Bombe, and I'm your host, Kerry Diamond. I'm the founder and editor of Cherry Bombe Magazine, and each week I talk to the most interesting women and culinary creatives in and around the world of food.
Since the holidays are upon us, I thought it would be fun to do a host with the most miniseries. So today and all December long, I'll be talking to some of the most sparkly folks I know about celebrations and how they approach get togethers, gatherings, gift giving, and more.
First up is Laura Brown, one of the most gregarious people in all of New York City. Laura is a writer and celebrated magazine editor who hails from Sydney, Australia. She is always at the top of everyone's guest list and is wildly in demand as a host. So I got Laura to share some of her thoughts on throwing and attending parties. We also talk about her career, dusting yourself off after professional disappointments, her work with the (RED) organization, and more. Laura is one of my best pals, so I'm so excited to chat with her. Stay tuned.
Today's episode is supported by Kerrygold. The holidays are here, and Kerrygold wants to help you make life more festive and delicious with its beautiful butter and cheese made with milk from Irish grass-fed cows. If you are baking, and I hope you are, be sure to stock up on Kerrygold Pure Irish Butter. Kerrygold's unsalted sticks are always in my fridge for whatever I need to whip up, cookies, cakes, biscuits, pie dough, you name it. Switching to savory for a sec, if you want to impress folks at mealtime, try Kerrygold's new Butter Blends. These compound butters are perfectly on trend and are great slathered on bread, tossed with some roasted veggies, or melted on top of a baked potato. Try Kerrygold Butter Blends in sun dried tomato and basil, bell pepper and garden herbs, or chive and onion. I'm sure you can think of a million ways to use them. And then it's not a holiday without a cheeseboard. If you are a long time listener, you know I absolutely love Kerrygold Cashel Blue Farmhouse Cheese. It's my favorite blue ever. There are lots of other Kerrygold cheeses to explore and adore, including the classic Kerrygold Reserve Cheddar and the Gouda-style Blarney cheese. Add some crackers. I love those ones with dried fruit and nuts in them, you know the ones, maybe some jam or honey and a little jar. Decorate with a few sprigs of rosemary, and there you go, a perfect cheeseboard. That's definitely one way to host with the most. For more on Kerrygold, visit kerrygoldusa.com, where you can find great recipes, product information, and a store locator. That's kerrygoldusa.com.
Some housekeeping. Cherry Bombe is throwing a fun shop and sip at the Alex Mill Mercer Street store in SoHo in New York City tomorrow night. That's Thursday, November 30th from 6:00 to 8:00 PM at Alex Mill. I'm co-hosting with Alex Mill's legendary CEO, Mickey Drexler. In case Alex Mill is new to you, it's the clothing company that's all about superb craftsmanship, high quality fabrics and timeless design. Come on by and say hi, try on a few things, pick up some great gifts for the nice and naughty folks on your list, and let's toast the holidays and each other. There will be snacks and of course cake. And we'll be debuting an Alex Mill and Cherry Bombe collab jacket in recycled denim. It's cute and classic and pale pink. They use botanical dyes. Very cool, right? And I can't wait for you to see it. If you want to come by, pop on over to our Instagram page and RSVP. Hope to see you tomorrow.
Now let's check in with today's guest. Laura Brown, welcome to Radio Cherry Bombe.
Laura Brown:
Hi Kerry Diamond. Hi Kerry Bombe.
Kerry Diamond:
Folks who know you from your magazine work might be surprised to learn you are a farmer's daughter.
Laura Brown:
I am. My dad was quite literally Farmer Brown. Can you believe it? My parents got divorced when I was five, so I didn't have a whole lot of hands-on farm life. Yeah, I weirdly grew to appreciate it later on in life when I wasn't trying to flee to New York City. No, he was a proper jolly Farmer Brown, really like the Farmer Brown you'd want to see in the dictionary.
Kerry Diamond:
No farm chores. You were not helping out.
Laura Brown:
I was too little. I was too little because I didn't until five. No, he couldn't really have me do anything. I was playing with the cats. I was four. I would drive and sometimes my dad would put me on his lap while he was steering and I would pretend I was driving the ute or something, which is like a utility truck. I can't claim a lot of farm legitimacy for myself.
Kerry Diamond:
So you didn't see a future in farming?
Laura Brown:
No. My mom and I moved to the city and I became interested in arts and fashion, all that kind of stuff and I ended up sort of propelling myself off that way, but also just the fact about the curiosity of otherness that I had being young in Australia before internet, before all that kind of stuff. So there was a lot of things that I sort of mythologized that I wanted to be part of.
I was trying my hardest to get out of there, to get out of Australia because of whatever I was romanticizing about the rest of the world. So there was no real farm dreams. Love going to visit now and everything. I love a farm, but no, I can't say it was in me. My sister got that part of my dad's DNA. I love animals. Love animals, don't need to milk them.
Kerry Diamond:
Why did magazines capture your attention and imagination?
Laura Brown:
Sort of similar thing, like delusions of grandeur. It was like this sort of world that I didn't think I could exist in that seemed so foreign and other and superhighway-ish and glamorous and creative and where things happen first and not second. In Australia it always felt like things happened second or third because the communications were not there. So everything felt-
Kerry Diamond:
No social media.
Laura Brown:
No, nothing.
Kerry Diamond:
No internet.
Laura Brown:
Everything felt secondhand and I just wanted to be part of where things actually happened the first time. I loved all of that image making. I loved glamour. I loved some sort of image that just took you away in your head. I kind of grew up when I was a teenager, it was a supermodel era.
Yeah, I loved fashion very early, started spending a lot of my money on it, but I worked when I was waitressing at my uncle's seafood restaurant, I would shell a lot of prawns and then go buy some designer outfit after I'd washed my hands. No, I could not think of anything else I wanted to do than be just fashion and Hollywood or movies or creative arts in some way, shape or form.
Kerry Diamond:
Wait, how did I miss this chapter about your uncle's restaurant?
Laura Brown:
Le Kiosk, which is his restaurant in Manly. Manly is a suburb of Sydney and there's a beach called Manly Beach. There's a beach that's covered in shells off Manly Beach called Shelly Beach because my people are very clear. Anyway, he had a seafood restaurant there called Le Kiosk, which means the kiosk. And so I worked there from 14 to 17.
Kerry Diamond:
What did you do?
Laura Brown:
Waitressed. I ran a candy store. Not a candy. What do you call it? We would call it a lolly shop, but it was like a sandwich, ice cream kind of shop on the beach. And then I graduated to waitress at 15.
Kerry Diamond:
Were you a good waitress?
Laura Brown:
Yes. Yes, I think so. I didn't know how to pour beer. I remember once I gave a beer to a guy and it was just all head because I didn't know.
Kerry Diamond:
I've done that.
Laura Brown:
They all looked at me and they're like, "What is this?" I was like, "What do you mean?" I was good. I think I was jolly. I could do really good fanning of a napkin.
Kerry Diamond:
What did you learn waitressing?
Laura Brown:
Social skills. Through high school or college, it gives you such a read on the world that's invaluable everywhere. So I think I just honed a lot of the things that I had presumed about myself socially or I could get along with people and I was a hard worker and hasn't really changed.
Kerry Diamond:
When and why did you move to New York?
Laura Brown:
I moved to New York on September 4th, 2001. I arrived a week before September 11th. I was staying with a girlfriend and I was all dazzled when I got here. It was New York Fashion Week. I'd gone to the Mark Jacobs show the night before in a pier and everyone was famous.
The next morning all of that happened and we were a bit confused for a minute, I think as anybody in the city was. It was a bit shocked. And what do you mean our day is changed, because you weren't computing the enormity of it at the time as anyone who I think is in sort of shock would. So yeah, I got here right before that, so that was pretty wild. And I just did a bit of freelance.
Kerry Diamond:
You must've been in a state of shock. You turned your whole life upside down to come here.
Laura Brown:
All the Australians were like, "You want to come home?" And I was like, "Oh no, I'm just in Gristedes just getting my tuna." No, I realized I think I lost it about two weeks in. It sort of hit me. But yeah, total shock.
There's a word I think is often used as a criticism, but I like it. It's guileless. I was just so guileless. I was like, "Well, I'm here now. I just got here." I didn't overthink, which is I think good because I otherwise would've left. But I worked for the New York Post for a minute in the fashion thing and then I worked at Talk Magazine and then I freelanced and then I started at W Magazine in 2002. After that, many things.
Kerry Diamond:
Tell us some of the other notable places you worked.
Laura Brown:
Notable places I've worked, W for a year and a half, Details for 89 months. And then Harper's Bazaar had been calling and they called once when I was just about to start at Details so I didn't go, but then I was like, "I'd like to go now." So I started Harper's Bazaar in 2005 with Glenda Bailey. Still my fast friend to this day.
But I was there for 11 years and had the most wild ride there. The job changed so much. I started, I was like, "Oh, we're editing two essays a month." And then I started booking the covers and then coming out with all these mad concepts for things. It really became like five jobs in all that time. Did so many shoots and I think lobbed some great stuff out into culture. A lot of really mad ideas, but very proud of it.
And then 2016 I got a call from One Time Inc. RIP. They were looking for an editor-in-chief of InStyle. So I went through this sort of speed dating process with a bunch of executives. They offered me that, and I started in summer of 2016. And then Time Inc. collapsed and then Trump got elected. Time Inc. sold to Meredith Corporation, which had us for the bulk of it. And then there was COVID.
It was such a wild five and a half-ish years. I say I had left nothing on the field there. I mean I had the best team. There were such brilliant producers. I'd come up with some crazy thing, and they'd be like, "Okay," and they'd just go off and do it. I think I was reminded, especially I'd been in magazines for a long time and I wasn't going to necessarily be a lifer in magazines, but I got this editor-in-chief role. And then there were so many challenges politically, historically, medically at the time.
It re-enlivened me in the whole business and it made me want to be on the right set of history and do the right thing and swing for the fences and go for it. No one wants to live through 2020 again, but it did coalesce all of us together to really take a swing because I think a lot of magazines were and are cautious because they're trying to keep their advertisers and everything else, which I understand. But if you have a platform as big as that, you've got to drive it like you stole it because it's not going to be forever and you've got to feel proud.
Kerry Diamond:
Drive it like you stole it is great advice.
Laura Brown:
Don't actually steal it.
Kerry Diamond:
You are known in the industry as a genius when it comes to magazine covers.
Laura Brown:
Thanks. I know. I was thinking about the other day. I have a bunch of them in a drawer. I was actually the other day thinking, God, I should Google my covers because I haven't done it for a while. Sometimes I'm reminded if I'm talking to an actress or somebody I've worked with on something and I'm like, "Bloody hell. I did some really crazy things." The covers I booked in Harper's Bazaar and the covers I did at InStyle. It's got to be 200 more, 250 covers.
Kerry Diamond:
Amazing.
Laura Brown:
You know what I mean? Conceptualized, cast, shot, promoted over and over and over again.
Kerry Diamond:
It was such a treat every month to see what you'd come up with.
Laura Brown:
Thanks, pal.
Kerry Diamond:
It really was, which is why the industry was shocked when the new parent company of InStyle-
Laura Brown:
Shocked.
Kerry Diamond:
... shut down the print edition, and you and a good percentage of your team were out of work.
Laura Brown:
We were. We got canned.
Kerry Diamond:
We'll be right back.
Today's episode is sponsored by San Pellegrino sparkling mineral water. There's no better way to add some sparkle to your holiday table than with premium sparkling water from San Pellegrino. The unique balance of effervescence and Rich minerality cleanse the palette and amplify subtle flavors, making it the perfect compliment to fine food and wines. And the cherry on top, we love how the iconic green bottles make any tablescape look festive and bright for the holiday season. I love San Pellegrino and always have a bottle in my fridge. I love it straight up or as a mixer. Looking for a mocktail to add to your holiday party? San Pellegrino Italian Sparkling Drinks are a beautiful way to add some bubbles to your non-alcoholic sips. You know I also love a mocktail. Team Cherry Bombe used the aranciata flavor to create a special non-alcoholic drink called Bombe Squad Bubbles at our mentor mentee dinner this past month. Made with blood orange cherry and San Pellegrino's aranciata Italian Sparkling Drink, it was the perfect way to raise a glass in celebration of women in the world of food and drink. For more on San Pellegrino, visit sanpellegrino.com/us. You can learn what they're up to, product information, and much more. That's sanpellegrino.com/us.
Now, back to Laura.
Laura Brown:
I mean, we got really spectacularly canned. It happens. We had new owners called Dotdash and they have their way. It was February, God, it's almost two years. I was fine because I was a little bit like the dog in a car with a head out the window trying to... I just was like, "Oh, look over here. What do you mean?" I'd registered my own business. I'd put it in a folder somewhere. So my mind was certainly wandering and I was under no illusions that me and my team had really kept this brand going and not the other way around. So very, very settled in that.
I spent a good amount of time after that just HRing my team. I've just never been very good at reading the rooms in office politics. I'm not very particularly interested in it. I'm just like, "Let's just go do the fun thing. Let's go do the thing." Our photo department had started their own company before we even got fired. It was like slow clap. Brilliant.
It was a great place to work. Straightforward, I'm just who I am. It was fun. You did stuff you were proud of. You tried to. You worked hard, you went home, had a glass of wine. Do it again. I remember it was like I got this such a crazy outpouring on text and Insta DM. It was like reading beautiful eulogies for yourself, but you're still alive. I was like, "I should print these out and put them in a folder for when I'm having a bad day." Lovely stuff. I was planning on going at the end of the year. I didn't know we were going to close this in February, but I never would've had this lovely reinforcement if I had just left.
Kerry Diamond:
I don't know if I ever properly thanked you, but I had a food column at InStyle-
Laura Brown:
You did.
Kerry Diamond:
... that also ended when the whole thing ended.
Laura Brown:
Table for Two it was called.
Kerry Diamond:
Table for Two.
Laura Brown:
And then it became table for zero because there was no one. I know, it was great.
Kerry Diamond:
That's sad.
Laura Brown:
It was lovely. It was a column where we'd have a fashion person or an actress and a chef. It was so charming.
Kerry Diamond:
And it was your idea. Why did you think that a food column belonged in a fashion magazine?
Laura Brown:
Because I think who comes together to enjoy food? People. And what is so much part of relationships and family and friendships. That's what interests me more. I love to eat food. I don't sit there and labor over what goes into a meal. I'm more interested in the characters of the people that make the food or how they interact together or the social kind of fun element of an interaction between people, and a meal is in the middle of it.
It's this lovely interaction that people have around meals that I love. I wanted to bring people's personalities and people into it. I just like people.
Kerry Diamond:
I think my favorite column was still the first one. Do you remember who the first one was?
Laura Brown:
Oh God, no. What was it?
Kerry Diamond:
Missy Robbins.
Laura Brown:
It was Missy.
Kerry Diamond:
And Jenna Lyons.
Laura Brown:
Missy Robbins and Jenna Lyons. That was a great one. Missy, what a legend. Jenna, what a legend.
Kerry Diamond:
And Jenna has an amazing kitchen. We shot it in Jenna's kitchen.
Laura Brown:
She does. I've seen it on the internet.
Kerry Diamond:
It's organized so perfectly.
Laura Brown:
Oh, I remember when she said something about... It made me laugh. It was like, no visible sponges. And I was like, "Dear God."
Kerry Diamond:
That's funny. No visible sponges. I forget that.
Laura Brown:
No visible sponges.
Kerry Diamond:
She did have the most perfectly organized spice drawer, so I went home and redid my spice drawer. She has them flat, so when she pulls the drawer out, they're all flat and you can see everything.
Laura Brown:
I've actually seen that at a Hollywood actress of note's house in Malibu. Same thing.
Kerry Diamond:
You started your own media company.
Laura Brown:
I did, LB Media, which is essentially LB in the media. Because I was thinking of peacing out at the end of last year, I had registered LB Media, like all good Fortune 500 CEOs on LegalZoom. They give you a binder with a little whole punch in it because you're going to have documents and you've got to put your documents in your folder. I just had that and it was sitting on a shelf. And then when all this happened, I literally was like, "Where's my folder?"
It's just me. I'm not particularly desirous, there's a word, of managing a team. I don't need to do quote, unquote "content". I've seen that. I don't need to look at how many hits a piece got. It's not my thing. I've done it.
I think what it is loosely is bridging between the worlds of luxury Hollywood fashion into the broader universe. So basically opening the door to the fancy land a little bit wider to be helpful to people and also to be just infinitely more interesting because it gets a little old, that world and a little vacuum sealed and a little carnivorous of itself, I think, if you let it. So it's much more interesting to broaden it.
Kerry Diamond:
You're working with the (RED) organization these days. What is (RED) and what are you doing with them?
Laura Brown:
(RED) was started by Bono, Bono and Bobby Shriver, in 2006 to fight AIDS in the Sub-Saharan Africa. There was a big Gap campaign with a bunch of actors wearing Gap t-shirts. And then 10 years ago or so, Bono guest edited Vanity Fair. It had Mandela and Oprah and Obama. They've made incredible strides.
Basically they're affiliated with The ONE Campaign and they've raised almost a billion dollars to fight AIDS, which we see in our rearview window here. But sadly, it is still the biggest killer in South Africa, which is an absolute effing outrage. Hopefully they can get to a vaccine in the next decade, but until then there's a huge amount of work to do.
It's just so unjust. It's like one, the AIDS thing because it's all treatable here, so it became less in the frontal lobe. Two, COVID, that overtook everything. I understand in people's bandwidth, God, it's been so challenging the past few years. You've got to look out for you and your family. It's just wrong that anybody should be suffering from this.
It also impacts the development of Africa as a continent. Imagine if you have a healthy population in Africa and what that does economically or just for the progress of everything. Also, Africa has the greatest style. It just does. The best style in the world is in Africa. It's the most natural, colorful, distinctive.
Part of my remit is one, bringing creators together to magnify this message and get it out there to get this thing done to work within the fashion community, to find designers to give them the tools they need to succeed internationally because it's absolutely ridiculous that no one can really cite an internationally famous African designer. That's just wrong. It's an introduction away. It's some resources away.
I'm deep in the mix of booking, and then I'm also bringing in fashion brands and just going, "Hey, will you do something for (RED)?" If a brand called me for something else, they're like, "Would you make something for (RED)?" they've always said yes. (RED)'s done amazing, amazing work.
It's all retail based, so they'll do a (RED) iPhone, a (RED) jeep, a (RED) set of headphones. I'm just bringing things in from the sandpit that I've been in, the fashion sandpit that they haven't. So I'm extremely proud they asked me to be involved in the first place. Stay tuned because there's going to be much, much more. (RED) goes faster.
Kerry Diamond:
A way folks can stay on top of everything you're doing with (RED) is through your Substack. You've shared some of your travels and some of your work. Tell us about your Substack, Laura Brown.
Laura Brown:
I think Substack is brilliant, especially for folks who've been laid off, who've been digital media, local newspapers. I think it's an incredible economic thing. You do have to really focus on it. Look, for me, it's not my main game. I treat it like a journal. I don't necessarily always write about fashion. I write about going to Africa. I wrote about having empathy the other day and last week I wrote about leopard print.
Two things I miss about magazines. One, deadlines, where you would have to have a deadline to put something out into the culture and it had to happen and then it would land. And then two, corporate health insurance, but that's another story. I just miss having a thought land because everything else I'm working on is potentially more exciting, more impactful, more lucrative, all that stuff. But it's slow.
This is like, bang. It's more just like I'm thinking about this this week and if you guys are interested in it. It's been lovely. It's just another outlet. I really urge young writers to look into it as a way to distinguish yourself. It's nice to write. I hadn't written for a while.
Kerry Diamond:
Everybody either wants you to host their parties or be a guest.
Laura Brown:
Wow, everybody?
Kerry Diamond:
Mm-hmm.
Laura Brown:
Did you poll everybody?
Kerry Diamond:
I did. I did.
Laura Brown:
Okay. Thanks, guys. That's very nice of you to say.
Kerry Diamond:
Curious, what makes a great host for an event, whether at home or a restaurant or at any venue?
Laura Brown:
Enthusiasm.
Kerry Diamond:
Enthusiasm.
Laura Brown:
Enthusiasm. Yeah, God, you've got to be happy to be there and you've got to be happy about the people that are coming and how they're going to mix with each other. You have to have a sense of occasion. Your sense of occasion doesn't have to be like everything is perfect.
What I think is being excited to be in this room with people that you like and admire and knowing they're going to meet each other at some point in the end and making fast friends with people. I never get tired of that. I think it's a particular privilege when it's you who are able to host and you who were able to bring those people together.
So it's not like, oh God, I've got to go to this thing, which we feel like we go to events all the time and it's a bit like, oh God, it's an obligation or this or that. Or I know that if I am hosting something, I think I can make it fun and easy and not intimidating and not a heavy lift. And you'll be well-fed.
Kerry Diamond:
I know you're not big on rules, but dinner parties need a little structure to be successful.
Laura Brown:
I host things for other people oftentimes or in collaborations with other people. It could be a brand, it could be a charity, it could be whatever. I think for me, I love shared family style as long as there's a good amount of it. You don't want to not have enough family style and you're fighting over the last bit of chicken breast.
But I actually went to a dinner. I wasn't hosting one. I went to a dinner at Tatiana Lincoln Center the other day, but it was so generous. It was like heaving with, but you could see everybody felt like little kids. It wasn't wasteful. It all got eaten, but it felt generous in spirit. Everyone's like, "Oh God, I shouldn't have eaten so much of the toast" because there was three courses later.
Feed people. Really feed people. Feed people like they'd be fed at a kitchen table. Well, I'm just not also the person for super overthought food or super high concept food. I don't like a tasting menu. I don't like to sit there for many hours. Ideally, I don't even need a knife.
Kerry Diamond:
Some of your favorite-
Laura Brown:
I can just twirl something or stab it.
Kerry Diamond:
Food you can twirl or stab, folks. That's a cookbook no one's ever written. So if you want to take that idea, it's up for grabs.
Laura Brown:
Half cooking, half murder.
Kerry Diamond:
What is your favorite dinner party food?
Laura Brown:
My favorite dinner food at any point is spaghetti pomodoro forever with a decent helping of cheese. That's a twirl. I just love pasta. I always have. It's the good time meal. It's the sad time meal.
Kerry Diamond:
Should you have a little cocktail hour beforehand?
Laura Brown:
Cheese. Yes, you can have that, but you need to have cheese. You need to have many cheeses. Now I'm obsessed with horseradish cheddar. It's so good. A good cheeseboard because you don't want people waiting around with their drinks and there's no food. I've been to a couple of things like that and everyone gets angry. Just put something in their mouth and they'll be happy to be there. Put a cheeseboard or whatever it is.
Kerry Diamond:
Even a breadstick.
Laura Brown:
Pass some stuff around. Ideally both.
Kerry Diamond:
Yeah. Hangry guests, no good.
Laura Brown:
Just show that you care.
Kerry Diamond:
What are your thoughts on seating charts?
Laura Brown:
You have to do it. If there's a bunch of young media kids, they all go together. If there's actresses, generally they'll go together. Everyone swims in similar schools of fish. I'm not necessarily the proponent that everyone's going to be so self-consciously mixed up because I think people get uncomfortable and they feel exposed. So I like to give a bit of buffering with one's own species a little bit and then a couple of other people.
But at a baseline, someone will know someone in the table and not just feel exposed and like oh God, there's 10 people and I'm tired and I'm nervous. You have to start an event with a feeling of comfort.
Kerry Diamond:
What is the best host gift?
Laura Brown:
Booze or a Spindrift.
Kerry Diamond:
What if you don't drink? Oh, Spindrift.
Laura Brown:
I love Spindrift. Shout-out to Spindrift.
Kerry Diamond:
Bring a six-pack of Spindrift to Laura's.
Laura Brown:
No, yeah, I love raspberry lime Spindrift. I love it so much. I really do.
Kerry Diamond:
Now I know what to give you for your birthday.
Laura Brown:
I really do. No, I think that that's just a lovely... whether people have it or not at the time. Just like a little hand towel or something too, like a thoughtful little thing like that for the kitchen. Brandon's, my husband's, mom actually screen printed some hand towels and gave them to us for Thanksgiving. It's very, very sweet. Just something little. But also, I am not the person who cares about any of that. I'm really not. Just show up. It all comes around.
Kerry Diamond:
Thank-you notes?
Laura Brown:
Oh, I'm terrible. What I do though is sometimes take a picture of myself in or with the thing and text it to showcase my delight. Look, different strokes for different folks. My friend Sherrie Westin, who's the boss of Sesame Street, writes the most insane thank-you notes. She sends everything for birthdays.
She's a better woman than me. I am not this person. I'll send a goofy picture of myself saying, "This is great. Thank you so much." But I think gratitude should not feel obligatory or forced. I feel like if you're grateful, you communicate that in whatever way is personal to you.
Kerry Diamond:
I think even today a text or an email goes a long way.
Laura Brown:
100%.
Kerry Diamond:
But you do have to send something. The worst is when you host and you don't hear from your guests afterward.
Laura Brown:
Oh, yeah.
Kerry Diamond:
That's awkward.
Laura Brown:
It's funny because I never host at my home or anything. If I had some big mansion out somewhere I hosted, but I'm hosting in restaurants or venues with someone and we all just go home. And then sometimes I might get a text going, "That was so fun." Or it's some people's Instagrams or whatever. That's fine. That's more than enough. But I kind of know that people had fun. I'm not like, "Oh, it's been four days and Julie didn't tell me she had fun." I'm good.
Kerry Diamond:
Julie. I don't know who Julie is, but-
Laura Brown:
I just made her up.
Kerry Diamond:
Hi, Julie.
Laura Brown:
She's the worst.
Kerry Diamond:
What's one of the best parties you've ever been to?
Laura Brown:
Oh, okay. But I believe it was our wedding, mine and Brandon's wedding, which was last April 2022, a twice postponed wedding because of COVID. We got married in Kauai. You were there. We got married Kauai, and it was the most beautiful chili of mixed up people. Not mixed up as in their heads, but just the most mixed up.
They were like the beans and the mince and the onions, whatever they were all together. They were from such different worlds. It was like my family who were farmers. It was actresses I knew. It was Brandon's college friends who did acapella. It was New York people. It was people from Europe who came to Kauai, God love them. And they mixed so beautifully. It was sort of, again, one of the first real post COVID events too that Australians could finally get out of Australia.
Everybody just kind of went for it. And it was so delightful and it was so fun. My husband, he sang acapella in college. He has a lot of friends who are musicians and performers. He has Broadway performer singing mates, he has drummers and guitarists and everything else. So they put together a band and it just did sort of top hits like Backstreet Boys and stuff. And people loved it so much. They left for the dance floor before they'd eaten half the meal, which was great. It was great.
It was just completely infectious and everyone had the best time. I just sort of was surprised it was ours, but it was like when you get people from different walks of life who show up for you and they're united by that in the first place. So that sort of baseline, I think for everybody else.
Kerry Diamond:
You famously wore a pink wedding dress.
Laura Brown:
I did. I wore a pink Valentino wedding dress designed by. I mean, I think people know me well enough now. You don't think, oh, couture wearer, Laura Brown at all. But a dear friend of mine, Pierpaolo Piccioli, is the designer of Valentino. I've known him for a dozen years since he and Maria Grazia at the time took over Valentino and they'd come up from the accessories department of Valentino. So he's been there for years and years.
Kerry Diamond:
Maria, who's at Dior now.
Laura Brown:
She's at Dior now. They would come into New York or whatever, and me and Glenda who's at Harper Bazaar would have a drink with them. We became really dear friends and I had asked him if he would design my wedding dress. It was his gift to me and I still can't believe it. It is the most gorgeous thing. All I wanted was this sort of off the shoulder thing and I wanted pockets, or as Pierpaolo would refer to them, pockets.
Kerry Diamond:
But whose idea was the pink?
Laura Brown:
Me. I'm trying to think about what imprinted on me, but it must've been maybe Gwen Stefani. She had a pink wedding dress when she married Gavin Rossdale. I think it was Westwood. White didn't feel convincing to me. And guess what? It feels convincing for the majority of the population, so God bless. But a pink wedding dress to me felt subversive in whatever way that it was.
I just really loved it. I knew what pink. He sent me these swatches of fabrics and I picked a certain one. And then he'd drawn it January 2020. I went over there right after we got fired. I didn't have a job, so I went actually, and I hadn't tried on my wedding dress and it was two months there before the wedding. So I took myself off to Rome and tried it and it was perfect. It was very beautiful. I had a very big veil that blew off my head. And then we had to clip it back in. It was hilarious.
Kerry Diamond:
It was hilarious. The pink was spectacular. It was like cherry blossom pink.
Laura Brown:
Thank you.
Kerry Diamond:
All right, before I let you go, let's chat about restaurants. Servers, hosts, chefs, so many of them light up when you walk into their places. What's that about?
Laura Brown:
I think I make everything a local as quickly as I can and not like it's my master plan. I have a sister, Emily, who was my dad's daughter, but I was raised an only child, and I would be inserting myself into the world in whatever way it was. So I think that's definitely part of that.
But I'm also, I'm happy to be there. If the place is great, I want to come back a lot, and I do. I have real strong locals that I come back to over and over again. I have the local sandwich shop in my neighborhood that they always give me a large orange juice when I ask for a small, because they're my mates now. I think you go out to eat, it's a real privilege and a treat.
Kerry Diamond:
But a lot of people treat folks in the service industry as if they're anonymous.
Laura Brown:
I married my waiter. I think one of the clearest signs of character is whether people are nice to their waiters. People who are rude to a waiter, just get out. Just go to the bathroom and skip out of there. I've never understood it because they're people. There's people there. They've got a voice in a head and body parts. Anybody I've ever dealt with in any sphere of occupation is just a person. To treat people as less than that, then you can just go and die alone.
Kerry Diamond:
And you did really marry your waiter.
Laura Brown:
I really did marry my waiter.
Kerry Diamond:
Folks might think you were joking.
Laura Brown:
No, I married my waiter. Brandon was my breakfast waiter at the Sunset Tower Hotel in Los Angeles. So he was my waiter. He brought me my huevos rancheros and took my heart. I don't know. We've been together eight years. Can you believe it?
Kerry Diamond:
Tell me some of your favorite places. Let's start with New York.
Laura Brown:
New York. Okay, I have two. Guess what? They both involve food I can twirl or stab. Barbuto, Jonathan Waxman in the West Village. I've known Jonathan. I first met him in... must've been 12, 13 years ago. My dad had just died. It was a weird day. I'd been up and down from Australia a bunch because he was ill. I got back. He died. I was scheduled to have dinner with a friend and I was like, "Do you mind if we just still have dinner?" because I didn't know what else to do. I was in shock, but I'd adjusted. I don't know what it was.
Kerry Diamond:
Your dad had been sick for a long time.
Laura Brown:
He'd been sick for a long time. And so we went Barbuto and Jonathan sort of came. I think we'd met a couple of times, but we've had a friend in common. He came to say hello. And he goes, "So how are you?" And I was like, "My dad died today. Can I have a double carbonara?" I think I ate double carbonara there for about two years.
Jonathan, I'm his greatest admirer. He's such a solid person. He's his own community. He's got such a great sense of character. He makes you feel taken care of. I feel like if I lost all my money, they would feed me. I can show up there anytime and it's lovely and fun. I like to sometimes bring them in some random person that blows their minds a bit. It's just funny. So I really, really love that place. The kale salad, chicken, pasta. Again, I've just eaten so much.
Also, my other favorite is Lilia by Missy, Missy Robbins. This is a really wild story. It must have been over eight years ago or around eight years ago. I was having dinner with a friend in Chelsea Market and there was a pop-up there, Italian place that Missy was cooking at. She'd just been at... Where had she been? She'd Left the restaurant that was in-
Kerry Diamond:
A Voce?
Laura Brown:
A Voce, yeah. She was just cooking. I was having this pasta and I was like, "Oh my God, this is incredible." We had some wine, whatever, but it was so delicious. And she came out, we were chatting. She's like, "I'm going to open my own place." I was like, "I'm going to be your first investor." So I had $50 cash and I put it in a little tip envelope and I literally am her first investor with that 50 bucks.
To see the success of what she's built with. Sean Feeney is so wonderful. She's also been nothing less than herself. I think what's funny about those two, actually Missy and Jonathan, they're not outwardly mushy. They're very straightforward. They're internally mushy for sure. At their core, they are the most welcoming people, but they're not gushy. They're not flagrant. They're not all about themselves. I think that's what attracted me to their places because they really run the most delicious caring places. That's New York.
Paris, Le Voltaire. Le Voltaire, see, this is another one, I made it my local. When I was younger, I used to do these birthday trips with my friend Cindy, and we would go to Paris when we were like 30, 31, 32, whatever, and we'd take a bunch of girls. We'd carouse about. I wanted to go to Le Voltaire because fancy people had gone there like Mick Jagger and lala.
So we would go to Voltaire for these dinners. For a few years, we went. It was always the most fabulous. It's right on the Seine with Quai Voltaire there. Beautiful location. There's long tenured waiters, so long tenured that when I get into my further into my magazine life and my editor life and I was going over there for shows, a couple of waiters are still there. It's just the greatest.
It's under a new ownership. There's a lovely guy called Angelo who's a Greek guy who runs it now, but it's the same as this guy Tiery. He's a legend. And same thing, I went there, such is Paris, a lot of people say it's intimidating socially, it's cold, it's whatever. I remember last time I was at fashion shows, which is probably last Feb, just gone. I was there for something and I didn't go to that many, but I went to the Valentino show. It was late and it was my last night and I'd already been there once, but I just texted Angelo. I said, "Can I just come in?"
It's Fashion Week. There's this big room full of people, and I'm just sitting there on my own having my steak au poivre chatting away. They're pouring out my wine. I felt so comfortable in this fanciest restaurant in Paris because they're all my friends. I adore that place. I'd say a similar thing Rome, Pierluigi in Rome, similar idea. It's outwardly fancy, but soft centered as well. Really, really lovely people.
Kerry Diamond:
Sydney fave?
Laura Brown:
I'm a bit out of it in Sydney to be honest because I'm obviously not there all the time, but there's a place on a wharf in Woolloomooloo, which is basically two bays around from the Opera House. It's called Otto.
Kerry Diamond:
Oh, you took me there.
Laura Brown:
Yeah, you've been there. It's just on a wharf. There's pelicans going around and cockatoos. People go there. Sydney people love nothing more than a five-hour lunch. So people were just kind of there in the sun, just sort of shooting the breeze literally. You can have a good pasta and a piece of fish and sort of wobble off home. I really, really like that.
And obviously Bondi Icebergs, which is right on Bondi Beach. Margaret. Neil Perry, who's probably Australia's most celebrated chef, he opened a place in Double Bay in Sydney, which is named after his mom. It is delicious. Just the most delicious seafood. My favorite restaurant, it's not pretentious, it's done with such a sure hand, but the fish, it's just doused in olive oil and it's just the best fish and the best olive. So it's just confident.
Kerry Diamond:
Amazing food scene. Tell us about your Sézane collab. This is a fun project you're working on.
Laura Brown:
Kerry is sitting in front of me, by the way, wearing a sweatshirt, by Sézane. No, Sézane is, I think, people are, God, they've really made a bit of a monster push into the U.S. of late, but Sézane is a French brand, that is, It's just the cutest. Morgane Sézalory, who started with a, I think it was an eBay vintage store, and so she's always been inspired by vintage, but then she started just making clothes and it's like the perfect little white lacy shirt, the perfect high waisted denim jean, the perfect little blazer, the perfect sweatshirt.
They're huge in Europe and they're really in the last few six months started to push here and open here. she DM'd me, saying, “Hi, I'm Morgan, I have run this brand, if you know it, blah, blah, blah. Do you want to collaborate?” I just think, you know, and I, it was such a charming, lovely ask and I was like, are you kidding? Of course. And so over the next week, obviously we had Covid in the middle, that's why it's almost three years later. But, went to see her in Paris, had this gorgeous office, lovely team. I went in for lunch, which is me, and girls, you know, talking about clothes and having, penne. It was so great. It was so my speed.
So this collection, which has just arrived, it's called French Enough, and it's really, landed really beautifully, I've got to say. And it's all B Corp, like it's all responsibly produced, it's well priced, it's well designed, it's really a great, a great, great business, so.
Kerry Diamond:
Are there other locations aside from the Soho one?
Laura Brown:
Ah, in New York, no, not yet.
Kerry Diamond:
Are they in LA?
Laura Brown:
Yes. There's one in Brentwood Country Mart. They've popped up and they Oh, that's a fun place. Yeah, they opened, they opened in Canada. Couple that were in Seattle, I think. I mean, they, Chicago, they're looking, if they haven't opened yet, they're in the midst of plotting it.
Kerry Diamond:
And you can shop online of course.
Laura Brown:
You can shop on the internet.
Kerry Diamond:
Tell me about the Choose Love popup.
Laura Brown:
We're going to pop up with Choose Love on December 1st off the ice skating rink at Rockefeller Center. Choose Love, it is a retailer. British started retailer to benefit refugees. One of my dear friends, Dawn O'Porter, she's a writer, she founded it with another couple of people.
Basically the philosophy of the store is you live with nothing, but you give everything. You walk into a Choose Love store and on the walls, you'll see a life jacket, you'll see a coloring kit, you'll see food preparation stuff. It's materials to help displaced people. There's a lot of education stuff, a lot of food stuff, literally like foil things for shelter, all of these things that we wish nobody needed, but they do. And so you can go in there and buy very specific things and know that that item goes directly to a family or a child.
Yeah, it's great to give money to charity, but you can go, "I want that thing on the wall to go..." Or you can go in, I think, I don't know if the price has changed, but it's like 500 bucks and you can get one of everything basically. You just leave and it's gone to somebody. It's the most gorgeous, lively bunch of people, so good-hearted, so fun.
Yes, they're actually popping up in Rockefeller Center. They're just off opening up on December 1st. They're literally on the ice rink level. You do not have to enter via the ice rink to be clear, but it is just on the lower level there. So please come by to Choose Love and help people who can't at this very minute help themselves. But help them build something.
Kerry Diamond:
Laura Brown, last question we ask everybody. If you had to be trapped on a desert island with one food celebrity, who would it be and why?
Laura Brown:
Yeah, I would want someone hardy. Who would be the hardiest?
Kerry Diamond:
Probably Gordon Ramsay.
Laura Brown:
Gordon Ramsay. What if he wasn't though? What if he just yelled a lot and then he was like, "I got bitten by a starfish?”
Kerry Diamond:
And made you do everything.
Laura Brown:
Oh no, I don't want to do that. Can I have Thomas Keller and Laura Cunningham from Per Se?
Kerry Diamond:
Sure.
Laura Brown:
Because what he can do with an oyster. No, I'd say Thomas and Laura. I'm great admirers of what they've achieved. I think they have lovely, gentle temperaments. Just nice to be around. So therefore I'm going to get two people, not just one.
Kerry Diamond:
And you know Thomas will cook.
Laura Brown:
Yeah, once we-
Kerry Diamond:
You will not be expected to do that.
Laura Brown:
Yeah, we're going to build all the fires and I will just sit there.
Kerry Diamond:
There we go. There we go. Thank you so much for your time, LB. It was great-
Laura Brown:
Thank you for caring.
Kerry Diamond:
Great to have you on the pod.
Laura Brown:
Kerry Bombe. You're the Bombe.
Kerry Diamond:
That's it for today's show. Our theme song is by the band Tralala. Thank you to the team at CityVox Studios in New York City. Our producers are Catherine Baker and Yasmin Nesbat. Our associate producer is Jenna Sadhu, and our editorial assistant is Londyn Crenshaw. Thanks for listening, everybody. You're the Bombe.