Pomellato

Nina Genillard

Nina Genillard (1933-2025) was a prominent international socialite and tastemaker during the mid-to late 20th century. Together with her husband Robert Genillard (1929-2016), a celebrated Swiss-born investment banker remembered as one of the architects of Eurobond market, she led an active and varied social life with residences in Switzerland, New York, Paris and Monaco. Leaders in the fields of world politics, diplomacy, business and the arts counted amongst their acquaintances, including President Ford, Henry and Nancy Kissinger and Baron Heini Thyssen-Bornemisza.

Born Dirkje Harmina de Boer in the Dutch colony of Aruba in 1933, she met her future husband in Caracas in the 1950s during the Venezuelan oil boom, where she was working as a personal assistant in an Italian bank and he was running the local investment arm of the prestigious New York-based bank White Weld & Co. They wed in 1956 and welcomed their first child in 1958. The couple was blessed with five children in total, being born in Caracas, New York, Zürich, Paris and Lausanne respectively, reflecting the family’s cosmopolitan lifestyle.

By the early 1960s, Robert Genillard took White Weld to Europe to develop its international arm, eventually establishing a partnership with Crédit Suisse and leading the Swiss bank's ventures into US markets. His vision is credited with producing a generation of bankers who viewed finance as a global, borderless puzzle. 

In 1968, the couple acquired the historic Château de St Vincent near Rolle on the shores of Lake Geneva. Embellished in the French-Style in the 19th century, the initial domain and its accompanying vineyards dates back to the Middle Ages. Throughout their many international travels, it always remained the  family's true home. In the 1980s, the couple also lived for a few years in Monaco while Robert led the Thyssen-Bornemisza industrial group as CEO.

Nina Genillard was a highly sophisticated and cultivated woman who could swap between Dutch, Spanish, English, French or Papiemento, the Aruban dialect, without a moment's hesitation. At the Château de St Vincent, Nina was the consummate hostess, especially on Sundays when friends streamed in to play tennis and laze around the dinner table. From her earliest days, she cared deeply about philanthropy and worked as a voluntary teacher in the slums of Caracas, teaching children and illiterate individuals to read and write. 

She was celebrated for her elegance and style and was dressed by the best couturiers of the day, her favourites always Yves Saint-Laurent and Pierre Cardin. Blessed with the ideal measurements and renowned for her beauty, she purchased haute couture creations straight from the Paris runways, thus preserving the artist’s vision without any compromises made for custom adjustments. She bequeathed key pieces from her wardrobe to the Musée Suisse de la Mode in Yverdon-Les-Bains. 

Nina Genillard’s jewellery collection reflects the style and magnificence of her days at the centre of international high society. Mirroring her busy itinerary, the jewels were purchased from Van Cleef & Arpels, Cartier or Buccellati in Monaco and Meister in Zürich amongst others. Most are still accompanied by their original invoices, offering unique insights into their creation. The collection features elegant and timeless adornments that complemented Nina’s haute couture ensembles at the most glittering social events of the last century. She displayed her very assured sense of personal style through her purchases. For instance, she commissioned just one black cultured pearl and diamond earclip by Van Cleef & Arpels as a special order to alternate as a mismatched pair with identical white cultured pearl earclips which she already owned. The magnificent and highly crystalline 3.24 carat emerald which she purchased from Meister in 1968 went through several iterations before she found the precise mount that gave her full satisfaction. The final version of the ring, a sophisticated, delicate two-tone gold creation by Gianmaria Buccellati, is offered together with its previous, more conventional mountings by Meister as well as the corresponding original design. As a whole, this collection presents a glimpse into the elegant lifestyle not only of Nina Genillard as an individual, but also of the vanishing glamorous world to which she belonged.