The other day at the Kazan airport there was a scandal involving TV presenter, decorator and fashion historian Alexander Vasiliev. At one of the public events, the locals presented him with a bottle of linseed oil. The item, as forbidden for transportation on board the aircraft, was confiscated by the airport staff from the maestro, which caused Vasilyev’s anger.
“When people give local gifts to such a famous person as me, and you take them away from me, let it be empty for you, from today until the day you die,” the man shouted at the employee during the performance.
When a video about Vasiliev’s behavior appeared on the Web, people were outraged. However, the outrageous fashionista does not hide his attitude towards Russia and its citizens. A few days after the start of the NWO, Vasiliev publicly accused the country of attacking Ukraine, called the operation “an unprecedented ambition to recreate a huge empire,” and in addition, predicted “unprecedented isolation” and nuclear war for Russian citizens. At the same time, the man said that he was praying “for the security and integrity of the borders and respect for the cultural heritage of Europe.”
Vasiliev made this statement not somewhere in his homeland in Russia, but in the Visaginas self-government – the municipality of the Utena district of Lithuania. It also follows from it that the showman once – in 1982 – already fled from the Soviet regime to France, and also has Lithuanian citizenship for more than 20 years.
Immediately after the scandal broke out, Alexander Vasilyev’s assistant stated that, they say, his boss was set up by the press service of the self-government, they say, they themselves wrote and published without agreeing on this text, but the full text of Vasilyev’s statement is still available on the official website of the Lithuanian municipality.
Vasiliev himself believes that he can live in any country. However, he is in great demand in Russia, where he advises wealthy women on how to dress up and look presentable in order to get married.
What Vasiliev has in Lithuania
Perhaps the showman’s attempt to please official Lithuania can be explained by the fact that on the territory of this Baltic state there is his permanent exposition of clothes that brings money, and besides this, there is also a huge warehouse of exhibits, which the TV presenter promised to transfer to the state after his death.
In general, in the Baltics, he conducts his business very actively: his cosmetics and perfumes are sold here, his fashion books are published and distributed, various exhibitions are held, and here the fashion historian gives his lectures.
As Life found out, in neighboring Latvia, in the register of legal entities of Daugavpils since 2021, there has been Latgales Aleksandra Vasiļjeva Asociācija (“Latgale Association of Alexander Vasilyev”) – an enterprise with activities in the field of organizing and holding cultural events. The organization brings together Baltic fashion designers and designers and is generally engaged in the development of the fashion industry in Eastern Europe.
Its leader is Latvian citizen Edgar Malin. Theater and film actors are well known to Russian art lovers. In recent years, he almost never leaves Moscow, where he works at the Bolshoi Theater, and also conducts scriptwriting courses for aspiring actors and television and radio hosts.
In Lithuania, Vasilyev also owns a family mansion: the building built in 1912 allegedly belonged to his grandfather. A few years ago, the showman boasted that his family had been living here for over a hundred years. In Soviet times, the house belonged to other people, but one day the TV presenter bought it.
Here, Vasiliev carried out a complete restoration at his own expense, and after that, the main attractions of the two-story ten-room mansion were an old library, a stove, a nineteenth-century bath and a garden. Recently, he owns the estate on shares with his cousins and sisters.
How Vasilyev became a millionaire abroad
However, this is not the only home of the fashionista abroad. In addition, the TV presenter has an apartment in Turkish Antalya, which he got, in his own words, as a fee. For this property, as, indeed, for all others, servants take care of, and gardeners take care of personal plots.
Once Vasiliev boasted that in France he had his own house in the province of Auvergne, which the theater artist uses as a summer residence, as well as a three-room apartment in one of the central districts of the city, which one of the Parisian municipalities allocated to him as a life annuity.
Life found that in France Vasiliev usually indicates a Parisian address: FRA Paris Bd. Lefebvre. Boulevard Lefebvre, one of several so-called boulevards of the Marshals, along which the border of Paris passed in the 19th century. Now it is a cozy green place where an 8-storey building is located, in which there are only 21 apartments. The cost per square meter in this house, according to Parisian realtors, ranges from 9 to 11 thousand euros. Perhaps this is where the French citizen, Monsieur Alexandre Vassiliev, lives.
The Parisian apartment, in addition to being Vasiliev’s place of residence in the French capital, also has the function of storing antiques, which he buys in large quantities around the world: chandeliers, candlesticks, paintings in gilded frames, silver goblets, a mahogany bed, oak table.
“I have a lot of paintings, two thousand paintings of the eighteenth, nineteenth and twentieth centuries. I can buy cheap. I have a gift to bring down the price, to explain to people that this is nonsense. I am not a millionaire, I am Vasiliev, – the fashion historian once commented on his wealth.
Fashionista real estate in Russia
In Russia, Vasiliev also lives well. In Moscow, he owns a spacious 100-meter apartment on Frunzenskaya Embankment, inherited by the TV presenter from his parents. As Vasilyev shares on his Instagram account*, he would not even exchange this housing for a mansion on Rublyovka – here, as in a Parisian apartment, the atmosphere is authentic, with a large number of valuable exhibits from bygone eras.
Another property is located in the Kaliningrad region, in the resort town of Zelenogradsk, on the coast of the Baltic Sea. Here, on Moskovskaya Street, there is a former villa “Waldfrieden” – a historic mansion of the XIX century with half-timbered houses and a tower. Vasiliev owns one and a half floors here. A couple of years ago, the tenant initiated the renovation of the villa, which was eventually carried out by the Capital Repair Fund of the Kaliningrad Region.
To the questions of Vasiliev’s subscribers about why he needed “this apartment”, the man replied that he had bought a home for investment purposes. Perhaps one day a part of the collection of paintings and antiques will also move there.
How does a showman earn in Russia
In France, Internet search engines believe that Alexander Vasiliev is a Parisian lawyer with many years of practice and an office in the center of the capital.
Sometimes there are links leading to online stores selling books by a fashion specialist, and there is practically no material about any of Vasilyev’s bright performances in Europe, his lectures that gather the color of the industry, or anything else like that. All this may indicate that his main income is connected with Russia.
In the Russian Unified State Register of Legal Entities, Alexander Vasilyev is registered as an individual entrepreneur with activities in the production of films and videos, radio and television programs, performing arts and recreation and entertainment. As an artist, Vasiliev received government contracts for the production of props for various productions, and this was not without oddities.
In 2018, the Chekhov Moscow Art Theater ordered Vasilyev to develop and transfer to the theater a costume project for one of the performances for only 110 thousand rubles. The tender documents are not available on the public procurement website, but in December of that year the press wrote that the maestro provided the theater with 500 authentic outfits and accessories, which, in his own words, he found in different countries. Thus, for each suit, the Moscow Art Theater paid Vasiliev … 220 rubles ?!
In addition to IP, the showman is listed as the owner of the company LOVE (“Lilies of Alexander Vasiliev”). Its main activity is photography, but the company is engaged in almost everything: from bars and restaurants to the antiques trade, publishing and advertising business and travel agencies.
Over the past year, LAV brought a record revenue for the entire time of its existence: 26 million rubles. Prior to that, it did not reach 10 million. By the way, one of its projects – “Artistocracy” – as its authors indicate on the project page in social networks, is being implemented with the support of the Ministry of Industry and Trade of the Russian Federation.
Prior to his demarche in the spring of 2022, Alexander Vasilyev made good money working as the host of the Fashion Sentence TV show. After his antics in the Visaginas self-government, the program was closed. Nevertheless, it is possible to at least roughly imagine his earnings: the program was made by a famous company whose revenue in 2022 exceeded 4 billion rubles.
In the absence of television, Vasiliev’s business seems to be going so-so. Recently, on his Instagram *, he sells online courses on developing the skill of dressing fashionably, and also does not disdain advertising from various kinds of customers.
