A new book reveals a bizarre feud between André Balazs and the former political leader of St. Barts — with the hotelier claiming the pol sabotaged his attempt to build a hotel on the island. A new book reveals a bizarre feud between André Balazs and the former political leader of St. Barts — with the hotelier claiming the pol sabotaged his attempt to build a hotel on the island.
In “Treasured Island: The Story of St. Barth. . . and its Barbarians, Billionaires and Beauties,” author Michael Gross claims the beef began decades ago when Balazs was dating Uma Thurman, and the Standard founder claims local big Bruno Magras tipped off paparazzi when the couple came to the island. (Balazs dated the Hollywood legend from 2003 until 2007.)
But it got uglier, according to Balazs — who has owned the Chateau Marmont in LA, the Mercer Hotel in Soho, Sunset Beach in the Hamptons and the Chiltern Firehouse in Lon don, among others — when he tried to build an eco-hotel behind the dunes of the famous nude beach Saline.
The project was sunk when 1,200 island residents signed a petition opposing it.
Still, Balazs now alleges to Gross the real problem was that Magras made a deal with a new island homeowner, Russian oligarch Roman Abramovich, to expand his nearby property instead of backing the hotel.
Magras dismissed Balazs’ accusations as “intellectual masturbation” and, oddly, “cat food.”
Offered the last word by Gross, Balazs stuck to his story of “corruption so severe” his lawyer “couldn’t penetrate it.”
He still owns the land, he says. “I guess I can camp out on it one day,” he quipped.
The book, from Harper Collins, is out now. Gross is the author of nearly a dozen books on the American upper classes, including “Flight of the WASP: The Rise, Fall, and Future of America’s Original Ruling Class,” “Focus: The Secret, Sexy, Sometimes Sordid World of Fashion Photographers” and “Rogues’ Gallery: The Secret Story of the Lust, Lies, Greed, and Betrayals That Made the Metropolitan Museum of Art.”
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