I just want to dwell on Le Club for a moment, before it is swallowed up in time, for no other reason than I sincerely enjoyed this smart little club. Igor Cassini with some help from his brother Oleg Cassini are given credit for the beginnings of this intimate European members-only club (à la Castel, Paris) in New York City. Le Club, which followed the large nightclubs such as El Morocco and the Stork Club and between the time that discos came into vogue. The Cassini’ brothers played a big role in promoting Le Club and as well initiating the intimate European-style club in Manhattan.
For a time Igor Cassini was the principal owner of Le Club, a members-only nightclub on the East Side of Manhattan. Mr. Cassini also claimed credit for coining the term Jet Set to describe the free-living, free-roaming international rich, and he was proud of the fact that he picked Mrs. Kennedy as ”debutante of the year” in 1948 when she was Jacqueline Bouvier.
He was the younger brother of Oleg Cassini, the fashion designer who was the official couturier for Jaqueline Kennedy when she was First Lady http://www.olegcassini.com/.
Igor Cassini, who as Cholly Knickerbocker was king of society gossip for the Hearst newspaper chain in the 1940’s and 50’s, then lost his job after he pleaded no contest to a charge that he represented the Dominican dictator Rafael Trujillo but without telling the government about it. I had dined with both of them over the years and a good many times at La Coupole in Paris.
Both Igor (2002) and Oleg (2006) are now deceased.
