Evelyn Lauder Memorial

1. More than 2,000 family, friends and civic leaders honored Evelyn H. Lauder at a Monday morning memorial at the David H. Koch Theater at Lincoln Center. Members of the Lauder family, Mayor Michael Bloomberg, Barbara Walters, Elizabeth Hurley and Dr. Larry Norton shared memories of Evelyn Lauder’s life during the service.

Husband Leonard Lauder noted that he has received more than 2,700 letters of condolences since his wife’s death on Nov. 12. “I cherish and embrace each of them,” he said. “Evelyn wasn’t a head of state, but reading those letters, it made me feel that she was.” writes WWD

Evelyn Lauder was born Evelyn Hausner in Vienna during World War II and emigrated with her parents to New York City to escape the Nazis, noted Bloomberg. “No one showed this city more passion than Evelyn,” he said. “It is fitting that we are at Lincoln Center, one of the city’s most cultural landmarks, to celebrate Evelyn Lauder, one of the city’s great cultural icons. Because if anyone’s life is worthy of celebration on a great stage like this, it is Evelyn’s. She taught for years in an elementary school in Harlem. She gave back to her family and helped build a business with just five products into the powerhouse it is today. She was a fiercely devoted mother and adoring grandmother and a Jewish grandmother to countless honorary Lauders. She had a warmness, a kindness, a generousness that put everyone at ease, whether you were a supermodel or an average Joe. She also knew life had the bitter and the sweet, and the challenge was to find the right balance.

Anne Sinclair @ Huff Po France

Anne Sinclair, right, and Arianna Huffington at a news conference on Monday in Paris. Thibault Camus/Associated Press2. Anne Sinclair returned to public life yesterday, speaking to more than 250 journalists in her new role as editorial director for the French edition of The Huffington Post website, which debuted yesterday.

The former TV anchor and heiress to an art fortune said there would be no conflict of interest in carrying out her editorial duties as scandal continues to surround her husband Dominique Strauss-Kahn.

Arianna Huffington, sitting by Ms. Sinclair’s side, defended her as a gifted journalist and a role model for other women.

Asked why she had picked Ms. Sinclair, Ms. Huffington reeled off a list of her qualifications, and then added: “Every woman in her private life — if not in her public life — has been through setbacks, ordeals and problems. When we see a woman enter the arena again, and get engaged with what is happening in the world, it gives hope and courage to every other woman.” via NYTimes

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