FHB Interview with SONSOLES DIEZ DE RIVERA Y DE ICAZA, MBE Vice-President of the Fundación Hispano Británica
Welcome to a collection of memories, personalities of all kinds and unforeseen events at banquets, those of an active Sonsoles Diez de Rivera, perfectionist, hard-working, unintentionally elegant, witty, and now, willing to learn new technologies because she never gets bored. To tackle everything, she sets out to do, she draws on her German and Latin streak, that of improvising. The point is to take risks because, as her father used to say, “si preguntas, te quedas de cuadra” (a Spanish refrain that means something like “Never complain, never explain”). She has been, for many years, the Executive Vice-President of the Fundación Hispano Británica.
ISABEL AIZPÚN
(Translated by ANA LUCÍA CERDÁN)
June 2024
In going through the interview notes, I came across some socks several times….
Yes, it’s about those socks that I had to wear until I was 18 because in those days social life used to begin when you dressed yourself with long trousers. I’m one of those little girls, even though I already had an amazing height. At school they all wore cotton socks and scrunchies and I was furious because I had to wear socks when I wore street clothes. I spent several months in bed with pneumonia, and when I left the bed, I could hardly walk because I had grown so tall. And my mother used to say that, despite my height, I had to wear socks, which embarrassed me a lot. So, I went to see my father and told him: “I have to wear socks” …and with him I bought my first sock stoppers and stockings. My father adored me and that’s the way I left my childhood and became a teenager.
So, once the socks were off, a new social life began.
I didn’t know many people of my age, but when I turned 18, my mother gave me permission to go to “guateques”. I was a bit anxious because I didn’t know anyone. My mother, who used to assist embassy parties that would have been very impressive, came into our bedroom, in full splendour, in wonderful costumes so I learned what you must do when you go to a party. So, I wore a long tulle dress like the book written by my mother’s older sister: “Dressed in tulle”. It was a Balenciaga dress. It wasn’t the first time because I made my First Holy Communion in one of his organza dresses, which was an evening gown with a reduced hemline for my size, that was later worn by my daughter and my granddaughter and it is now in the Balenciaga Museum, there is only another one in the Metropolitan in New York. When I was 15 Balenciaga gave me another one in white pique, and I have a photo with sandals and socks next to a friend of my age who wore stockings and closed shoes, and me with socks…
What was the social life that began then?
I grew up between two stunning beauties: my mother and my sister. My mother used to advise me to be very careful being brunette, because, immediately, brown hair soon looks dirty and that’s why is necessary to have spotless hair; so, they used to give me a hair paste that was used by my brother, called Varon Dandy, and I used it with a middle parting and two ponytails. Furthermore, my sister, who was blonde, marvellous, with light eyes, was full of curls because it was said about blondes that if they were tousled, looked cute. All my life I’ve thought well, I’m the ugly one, I have no place between these two. To be seen, how do I have to be? Well, I must be the most astonishing, the funniest, the most different, the wittiest, the most entertaining, and the most useful. I love that. I am quite a handywoman.
The term “handywoman” is understood to mean a “fix up everything”…
Yes, as an adult I’ve never given orders to do anything that I haven’t checked I know how to do. If I order people to iron shirts, it’s because I know how to do it. I scrub wonderfully and I don’t mind saying. My mother used to say, but where did you get that spirit of maid from? Because, of course, my sister, who was wonderful, was totally useless. She called me one day and said: hey, since you know everything, can you send me someone to fix the windows? And I said: yes, I’m coming. You? She said surprised… I’ve always had a passion for hardware and haberdashery shops. When visiting the USA department stores, with my mother, I used to stay in the hardware section, fascinated by those marvellous magnetic screwdrivers.
So, I was between the screwdrivers and Balenciaga….
There was a moment when I didn’t realise that I already had a woman’s body. My mother, who was a great admirer of beauty, realised it and that was my catastrophe because all my friends wore swimming costumes called Orquídea, with skirts, but my mother had Esther Williams swimming costumes brought over from the United States, tight, without skirts, and at fifteen… I looked like I was 18. Balenciaga gave me a suit when I was 15 that made me look fat and I thought it was horrible. One day, at home, I wore the suit so that he could see me, and he looked at me, pulled his glasses and he said: ” you’re not happy”… and I said: “no”… So, he said to me: “But it’s elegant…” And I replied to him: “I’ll be elegant when I’m 35, but now I’m 15”. He laughed and let me choose another one.
I started to be the wild card in a Spain that was evolving regarding fantastic parties, with spectacular buffets, with feathered pheasants and orchestras. I’m from the rock and roll era but played by a live orchestra. Until the sons of ambassadors arrived with their turntables, sandwiches, and things like that. And we all thought it was fourth rate stuff.
At that time… you did not yet imagine you would become a protocol expert
Nowadays nobody really knows what protocol is. At home, all the children used to eat at the head table. We all gathered, my father and mother, a servant in tails and a dining maid, whoever was there, from Antonio the dancer to Prince Ataúlfo de Orleans, Dionisio Ridruejo, Miura or the bullfighter Domingo Ortega with his wife or Ortega y Gasset. My mother used to control everything, and we could only speak if we were addressed, and then we had to know how to address the royal highnesses or Doña Carmen Polo, who never ate at my house because my parents were monarchists, even though she was a friend of my mother’s sister-in-law. We had to address her, but my mother forbade us to call her madam because that treatment was proper for Royal Highnesses, so I learnt to say everything in an impersonal way.
Did any visit make an impression on you more than others?
I remember Ortega y Gasset because his Spanish was perfect and his voice was very sonorous and masculine, although I didn’t understand anything he said because I was a fifteen-year-old girl. I remember sitting next to him, and he was talking with his back behind me sitting at the dining room table with my mother and, suddenly, I saw him put his index finger in front of my face and, without turning around, he said to me:” I’m sorry I don’t have an eye on this finger…” I didn’t realise he was the genius that he was supposed to be…
Later ¿did you miss those meals and those get-togethers?
I married very young because at 19 I thought I was the “owner of the truth”: white was white, black was black, good, and evil, there was nothing in between. I considered myself a grown-up… now I doubt everything. There is no black or white. At that moment I felt very old myself, so I got married and immediately had two children. My husband was very complicated. His family had a lot of business, but suddenly his father went bankrupt and at that moment he, who was a very intelligent PhD in Engineering, collapsed and couldn’t get over it. He became self-conscious and we entered a very difficult time. I had to separate from him because for a while I had decided to endure and endure; then, he used the children, leading them to bad schools; so, all this harmed them a lot. My father had just died, and I thought to myself: “I have to get out of here”. I started to work, and I figured out that I have good sales skills with great organisational skills too, so I worked in a company of urban furniture and another one of turnkey hospitals, achieving great results.
I already had a Saxon organisational streak, because of the German and English nannies, but I also have a Latin improvisational streak, so I have both facets. I’m dogmatic, which is what I usually stick to, but if something goes wrong, I improvise like crazy.
That was a big life change… was it like starting from scratch?
I was young then; it seemed normal to me. It was very entertaining; until the time came when those companies closed. For a while I took care of an uncle of mine who was in a wheelchair and organised his house as my mother had asked me to do. There were moths that I thought were an endangered species, but they weren’t, because they were all there. I organised that house and when I was dismantling it when my uncle died, the Secretary of State for Culture, who had seen me work and socialise, called me one day and suggested that I take up the position of head of protocol at the Prado Museum. He had noticed that the illustrious personalities who visited the museum were not being treated as they should have been… I liked challenges. I was 50 years old, and I began my glorious era.
Glorious because of the illustrious visitors…or because of getting to know the Museum itself?
Because I showed the Prado Museum to many interesting people like President Carter, one of the most cultured people who visited it: everyone wanted to see Velázquez and Goya, but he asked about the work of El Greco. Madonna was there with her little girl who had a lollipop that she was trying to give to one of the Meninas and I had to tell her to be careful because she was going to get the painting dirty…
The director of the Prado Museum was a magnificent researcher, but he had agoraphobia, he didn’t want to accompany visitors and he delegated to me. I was accompanied by one of the curators and I learned anecdotes. For example, I used to tell the visitors, in front of the painting of the Duchess of Osuna, that didn’t get along with the queen and to annoy her she dressed all her staff in a suit like the one she knew the queen was wearing for the first time. These things used to amuse them and watched more attentively at the painting.
When we arrived at the painting of Philip II’s sister, regent, and dowager queen of Portugal, I explained to them that she was a very pious lady, the only one who entered the Jesuits where only men were admitted, and that she entered under the name of Brother Mateo. I would tell them these kinds of anecdotes, which they liked, and when someone important came, a security policeman would also accompany me. After a while, I was told that the security people were fighting to accompany me because I presented a much funnier Prado than the conservatives. It was a wonderful time. I left there because the president of the Patronato hated the Secretary of Culture of the Ministry, and he didn’t like my appointment, so one day when the Secretary was abroad, he told Fernando Checa to fire me.
In any case, it must have been an eventful time…
The truth is that curious things happened. On one occasion a Chinese minister came to visit the museum and I was assisted by an expert in Italian painting. The Chinese couldn’t care less about Italian painting; they were crazy about the hard stone tables in the Prado and stared in wonder at those tables while Rubens’ Graces were explained to them. Although they were interested in those too on one occasion… We brought a very tall, very big Chinese man there, who turned out not to be the guest personality but his bodyguard. We led him to see the Three Graces by Rubens, which was being restored, and suddenly, we saw the colossus pointing his hands directly at The Graces’ back. We had to inform him it was forbidden to touch it.
I also remember that the offices were going to be moved and a building was bought opposite which had to be refurbished. King Juan Carlos was going to inaugurate them, and I ordered tapestries, and it was urgent for the following day to put up a commemorative stone for the King to unveil, and nobody had thought of that. They called me, and I got it, and the next day the Director asked me how I had got it, and I asked him if he liked it and, seeing his face, I said: it looks a bit mortuary, doesn’t it? I ordered it from the cemetery!
Because of the Latin strain…
That’s where my Latin improvisation worked. It was the only way to have a tombstone from one day to the next and for a sculptor to have time to sculpt the definitive one.
I also remember that the building had to be completely refurbished. Once it was announced that the King was going to inspect the works, and to have a view from somewhere in the Museum to see the building from in front of it.
When everything was ready, they realised that you could only go up in an external lift and the Security refused, so I discovered that from a low window, you could easily access a terrace of the Museum and have a full view of the whole building opposite. I tried it first along with the protocol people who were shocked that the King had to make a little jump through a window, but I knew it would amuse him and indeed it did. I said to him: Sir, they don’t want me to jump through a window that I have prepared, and he replied: Where is it, I’m coming!
On another occasion a room had to be set up because a head of state was coming to see the Titian paintings and they wanted him to sign the book on a table that had to be moved. When they were going to call for some removals, I took the table, moved it and that was it. I said, “Removals? That’s how security guards and others learned that Sonsoles do things and they always gave me a hand.
One day I went in with the director, who was behind me and, as always, with his head down, and they asked him, “Who are you?” He was a person who knew a lot but was very shy, always sitting in the office.
Of course, all those you had to attend to were interesting people…
One day the Grand Dukes of Luxembourg came, and I did learn something interesting from them, because they brought binoculars which they used to look at the paintings, especially some of Patinir’s landscapes. They gave them to me, and something happened to me like Alice in Wonderland: I immersed myself in the painting. Watching it that way added volume and depth; it was such an experience that now I visit museums and cathedrals with binoculars; even once I tried to see a landscape with binoculars.
In short, that time at the Prado was a glorious period.
The truth is that I became a woman at El Prado. What a lovely time!
However, other projects with challenging protocols were going to appear …
I joined the State Society for the centenaries of Philip II and Charles V. Those were the glory days of marvellous exhibitions. The most important was that of Charles V, in Toledo, for which the King of Spain invited all the heads of state and kings of those territories that were once under the rule of Charles V. I moved to Toledo just to organise that lunch plus that of the retinue, doctors, a total of 500 people. I studied what they ate in the time of Charles V; and I organised typical menus of that time, with the chef. For the starter it was blancmange, a dreadful mixture, made with almonds and I don’t know what else…, a delicacy in those days. There were two types: daily and Easter. We decided to prepare it as a salad with chicken, lettuce, and a white mayonnaise, without egg yolks, just the egg whites, and we added almonds. All that reminded me that in my day there was a glue called pelikanol that was made with almonds. It stuck well. For the second course we chose stewed partridges and finally, marzipan for dessert.
I made the centrepiece in an Arcimboldo style: fruits, vegetables… I contacted Duarto Pinto de Coelho, and we ordered tableware in Talavera, blown crystal glassware, and thread tablecloths bordered with bobbin lace. I used to enjoy myself. Those days, I didn’t choose staying in a Parador but in a guest house, place where I bring my chairman. At first, he was very surprised to stay there, but I told him: “it has bed, bathroom, breakfast, everything very well equipped, a bit monastic style, is true… but next to the exhibition. That’s just what we need, something much more convenient”; and he understood.
There I learned that people let themselves be commanded when commanding them; what you can’t do is be wavering. I remember the day when the new rooms of the Prado Museum were inaugurated, and Baron Thyssen came. He had given some paintings to the museum, and he wanted to go to the curators’ room, though he knew it wasn’t allowed. I had to address him and tell to leave the room because he wasn’t allowed to be there. And he left without any problem.
So, does protocol have any authority?
What you can’t do is constantly go around apologising. You must be very clear about that. My father used to say: “el que pide permiso se queda de cuadra” (a Spanish refrain that means something like “It’s easier to ask forgiveness than get permission”.)
Why don’t we also talk about elegance, before and today?
Humanity has been always looking for comfort, pleasure, beauty, in music, in painting… It’s about showing you something that makes you feel better; but now we are living in the age of ugliness. Like ”let’s see if I make you vomit with that painting you can’t look at” or “let’s see if I make you uneasy with my clothes”. Fashion is dreadful, people don’t know how to dress. Even the most elegant women wear beautiful clothes, but inappropriate for the occasion. You can see beautiful dresses, but they are cocktail dresses, not for using them in the morning, for example. What are they doing with those long necklines or those long tails, which are no good for those outfits.
Elegance is something that, if you wish, you learn. I’m tired of people telling me “You’re so elegant”… Let’s see, for example today I’m wearing a Marks&Spencer shirt, trousers from “a flea market” in Asturias, boots from the internet and a jacket from the Nuevo Futuro flea market. It’s all about knowing how to wear it. I have a certain reputation for being stretched, but it’s not like that, the fact that I’ve been taught to stand tall. My grandmother taught us that a woman never lies down, and she died like that at the age of 92. She used to say that a woman lying down is a woman looking for war…
And what future do you visualise for fashion and protocol?
I wish there would be a kind of “beyond” because I’d like to go in there to gossip, instead of standing on a cloud with a lyre. I’d love to see what happens in 50 years. We have such a bombardment of information that it is quite hard to remember so many things.
And when does the British Hispanic Foundation appear in your career path?
Pedro Schwartz and his wife found me, the year they decided to give a dinner dance at the Ritz, something I considered quite difficult because in Spain there was no way to pay to go to a ball. In Spain you had to be invited. I learnt a lot during the time of Felipe de la Morena, a real gentleman, an elegant person on the outside and on the inside who knew how to behave in different places and environments. He knew them all. I replaced the ball thing with the fact of bringing an orchestra to the Prado Museum for a private event. I’m Sagittarius and I’m a chatty person, so I asked St Martin in the Fields to come, or I wouldn’t do anything. And, surprisingly, they came. Roger Fry has never let me leave, although I have resigned several times. But now, I’d love to put on a headscarf, a blanket, a brazier, a parrot, and my crochet work.
It looks like you’re going to get bored after having had so much activity and achieving the MBE, the Cross of Isabel the Catholic, being executive Vice-President of the Cristóbal Balenciaga Foundation and Trustee and Vice-President of the FHB…
I never get bored. Now I am learning “itañol”, I have discovered ChatGPT…Besides, the world of bullfighting is always there. I am a subscriber to the Seville, San Isidro, San Sebastian, and Bilbao Fairs. For several years I have written articles about the Bilbao bullfights in Diario 16 and a chapter of the Maestranza of Seville bullfighting prints book, about the bullfighting costume, something that, curiously, is not talked about much.
What do you propose now for the Fundación Hispano Británica?
There was like an impasse for a few years but now, with the management of the new President, we are living a moment of excitement with great and interesting projects.
