On a conference call Tuesday, Tom Barrack, a private-equity investor who is one of the lead planners of President-elect Donald Trump‘s inauguration, told reporters not to worry about the lack of high-profile celebrities at the January 20 ceremony. Rather than fill the capital with A-listers, Barrack said, Trump’s inauguration will feel a little more, um, intimate.
“We’re fortunate in that we have the greatest celebrity in the world, which is the president-elect, side by side is the current president,” Barrack said. “So what we’ve done instead of trying to surround him with what people consider A-listers is we are going to surround him with the soft sensuality of the place.”
Indeed, the transition to a Trump presidency has upended yet another norm. Washingtonian could find no instance in which any of the first 57 presidential inaugurations were described as having a “soft sensuality.” But here are some things that have:
- “Modern gentlewomen,” as described by the stylist and author Navaz Batliwalla
- “Chunky braid” hairstyles
- The Internet‘s album Ego Death
- Sofia Vergara‘s wedding dress
- Roy Lichtenstein’s “Nurse”
- Selena Gomez
- Anish Kapoor’s sculpture
- Jennifer Lopez
- Salvatore Ferragamo’s “re-imagining” of Cinderella’s glass slippers
- A home fragrance by the chef Joël Robuchon
- A Dancing With the Stars performance by Brandy and Maksim Chmerkovskiy
- Stucco
- Madonna
Benjamin Freed joined Washingtonian in August 2013 and covers politics, business, and media. He was previously the editor of DCist and has also written for Washington City Paper, the New York Times, the New Republic, Slate, and BuzzFeed. He lives in Adams Morgan.
