Although French by birth, for the past four decades, more than half her life, Olivia Valere It was Marbella. For those the remains of him will rest in marbelladespite He died this Thursday in Paris. Her health condition had worsened and she was transferred to the French capital to continue medical treatment near her children. A stomach cancer that she had been suffering from for a year has been the cause of her death, she at 75 years of age.
For four decades it was a businesswoman of success, the undisputed queen of the night, the party icon in Marbella and its premises, the obligatory step on the night route of numerous public personalities since the 80s.
In the last interview granted to this newspaper on March 6, in a special on Women’s Day, Valère highlighted the importance of training to break the glass ceiling and promote female entrepreneurship.
It was in 1981 when the French opened her first nightclub in Paris, called Olivia Valère, a time when “there were only men who took care of nightlife”. In that first stage, with the obstacles inherent to the business and the added problems of gender, she had to “work a lot, almost 18 hours a day”. To this she had to accompany her work as a mother.
As he explained in the interview, the club he created in Marbella “is a small copy” of the Parisian, characterized by being “a trendy place where the famous of the world came as customers to spend a good night with their friends” and which remained open until 1995.
In 1984, Valère discovered Marbella at the hands of his “friend”, the singer kimera, who invited her to her “birthday” in the Costa del Sol city. “I immediately fell in love” and since “in Paris there was less work in the summer”, she decided to “open a club in Marbella”, in addition to having others in Morocco, Argentina or Lebanon.
Valere was a enterprising in a few years in which women had much fewer opportunities than now. “First, you have to show that you are capable, and when people see that you are professional little by little the admiration begins, but first you have to show that and with work it is very important”, she explained. Hardworking and fighter, Valère has lost this last battle but has left a mark that will serve as a mold for new generations.