The email was dated November 23, 2015, the day after the elections that made Mauricio Macri president.
The subject said: “Bruno Barbier.”
And the text, addressed to journalist Marcelo Larraquy, was friendly and emphatic at the same time.
“My name is Géraldine Smeets, I am Belgian, I have lived here in Argentina for 19 years. I am manager of the Belgian-Luxembourg Chamber of Commerce, and through my activity I personally know Bruno Barbier,” she introduced herself.
And immediately, without anesthesia, he got to the point: “I would like to tell you, despite the fact that several years ago he was awarded the title of count here in Argentina, that he does not possess it. At no time was he or his family part of the Belgian nobility. Best regards.”
Larraquy had just published in the newspaper Clarion a note titled: “Juliana Awada: the new first lady, educated to smile.” There he listed as a summary: “He lived for ten years with a Belgian count. He is elegant and sexy. He deepened his relationship with Macri at the gym. He avoids politics. Hermès wallet and clandestine workshop.”
But at least the first point was incorrect. And Géraldine Smeets did not want the mistake to be overlooked.
Did he want to unmask the false count?
Larraquy gave me the curious email for this chapter and explained:
–I never published the clarification. The note had already come out and it made no sense to dwell on that detail.
But what for the journalist was a detail, an inaccuracy of those that abound in the arduous job of reporting, to Juliana could seem like a matter of life or death.
In almost ten years of relationship, neither Bruno Barbier nor she had taken the trouble to clear up the misunderstanding, despite being figures who regularly appeared in entertainment magazines. They were famous, partly because Juliana was already shining at the head of the designs and communication work of Awada, a leading brand, and partly because her better half was not just anyone – a gray lawyer, a cold dentist, an anonymous merchant – but he held the title of count.
Count and foreigner, even better.
He was a member of the European nobility, as was repeated again and again in the media.
She belonged to the international jet set, to an environment in which the beautiful Juliana definitely felt at ease.
Too bad the busybody Géraldine Smeets had to come and break the spell.
When I consulted a friend of the first lady about this matter, public relations specialist Hernán Nisenmaum, who promised to act as a mediator with her, the response took endless days to arrive.
Finally, Nisenbaum conveyed to me, somewhat disenchanted:
–What you asked is true, Juliana says that Bruno Barbier is not a count.
–Do you have any other noble title? –I tried to maintain fiction.
Nisenbaum denied:
-No, nothing.
–They also told me that they never got married –I continued probing.
“How strange,” said Juliana’s friend, “this is the first time I’ve heard that.” I’m sure they were married.
But not.
Despite the interviews in which Juliana always talked about her “husband” or her “marriage” with Barbier, those close to him confirmed to me that there was never a marriage, nor was there a division of assets when everything was over. The same is clear from public records about both.
Juliana was not married to a count. She was “together” with a commoner.
Millionaire, yes.
It is time to formally introduce him to the protagonist of this chapter: Bruno Laurent Phillipe Barbier – how not to confuse him with someone from the nobility with such a display of names – is heir to one of the richest families in Belgium, owner of a fortune estimated at 370 million euros. He is the grandson of Joseph Vandemoortele, owner of one of the most important food companies, which manufactures margarines, oils, sauces, breads and cakes. The specialized media in Belgium claim that Vandemoortele’s assets are one of the 25 largest in that country.
What was Barbier doing, besides spending it, when he met Juliana Awada? In Argentina he was president of five companies. Two of them, Gapp Semillas and Fipan, dedicated to agricultural exploitation and the development of agricultural and livestock enterprises. Another of his firms, Erelle, aimed at the design and manufacture of modern furniture, works of art, mirrors and sculptures. Instead, his FM2B company provided services to internet portals and specialized in database research, software licensing and sales. The last firm he presided over, Agro Invest SA, owned by European shareholders, owned and exploited 32 thousand hectares of soybean fields in Buenos Aires, Santa Fe and Santiago del Estero.
Media lawyer Mauricio D’Alessandro, who knows Barbier well, believes his wealth is overvalued.
–He has money, but not the 400 million euros they said –he confided to me.
To conquer Juliana, anyway, it was enough.
As in a modern fairy tale, Barbier met her in the business class of an Air France flight heading to Paris. It was the winter of 2000 and she was already 26. Chance placed the Belgian businessman in a seat next to hers, barely distanced by the aisle. First there was some funny comment from him, some smiles from her, and then the friendly conversation became more intimate, in the middle of the night over the Atlantic, whispering so as not to wake the others.
“Pomi” Baker, who was accompanying her daughter, was sleeping in the seat next to her. Or maybe he was pretending to sleep to give them privacy.
Juliana was shocked by the Belgian’s manners. His limitless chivalry, his anecdotes as a man of the world, his refinement, even his well-kept baldness and his difficult Spanish crossed by French words and an undisguisable foreign accent. He had never met a candidate who could easily be mistaken for a count.
When they landed in Paris in the morning, they had already exchanged cards and talked about future meetings.
The gallant, who had to continue his journey to Belgium, said goodbye warmly.
He informed “Pomi,” smiling:
–Madam, I am going to marry your daughter.
Many years later, the clueless Susana Giménez invited Mauricio Macri and Juliana to her program, and asked him:
–But when was it that on a trip to Paris you spoke to the mother and told her “I’m going to marry your daughter”?
Juliana broke the awkward silence:
–No, that’s my previous husband…
“That’s the previous one,” laughed Macri, who, as we’ll see, doesn’t like Barbier at all.
Susana looked down, embarrassed.
Macri was tempted:
–Production, production, everything is closed! We’re off the air!
–I’m dying… –Susana apologized.
But we must go back to the beginning of the love story between Awada and Barbier. Weeks after that crush on the plane, the relationship became official and she moved to his large house in the charming Barrio Parque, on 2800 Ombú Street, next to another imposing property that was once inhabited by Macri and his first wife, Ivonne Bordeu.
Juliana came from a time of certain anguish after the separation from her first husband, Gustavo Capello, and the gossip within the family that pointed to another leading man, Luis Ruzzi’s nephew, as the person responsible for that marital failure. But neither had she found what she was looking for in that transitional boyfriend – so to speak. When Barbier appeared, Ruzzi’s nephew was definitively forgotten. Like Capello before him.
A friend of Juliana’s who asked not to be identified confided in me:
–I think that from the age of 16 onwards, she was not single for a minute.
–What does it mean?
“That,” said the friend. It’s just a fact, not a value judgment.
The truth is that the false Belgian count turned Juliana into another woman. At his instruction she learned to speak French, and soon became accustomed to spending the summer in Monaco or the Amalfi Coast, touring Paris by bicycle and memorizing every corner of her favorite city, to traveling by private plane to Punta del Este, discovering the landscapes of Eastern Europe and also accompanying him to Switzerland or Brussels when necessary.
A princess life, with trips around the world and exclusive friendships. For example, Máxima Zorreguieta, the queen of Holland whose title was real and who knew Barbier well: the two would occasionally cross paths in Amsterdam or in the Patagonian Villa La Angostura, a habit, the latter, that Juliana also inherited from her partner.
Another notable friendship of those times was that of the Saguiers, shareholders of the newspaper The Nation and related to Barbier in some agronomic venture. Juliana became close to the wife of Fernán Saguier, the newspaper’s deputy director, and even had the power to request a change of photo or title in the reports that the media did.
* Extracted from the book “Juliana” (Planeta, 2016)
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