Interview

Blasberg: You stayed in California for a while, from middle school to university.

Zhukova: Yes, I went to UC Santa Barbara. It was amazing, maybe one of the most fun experiences in my life thus far. It was a totally stereotypical American experience.

Blasberg: What did you study at UC again? I sometimes forget how brainy you are.

Zhukova: I did pre-med, Slavic studies, and literature. Basically, it was a lot of science classes, with a bit of Russian.

Blasberg: While you were studying, were you going back to Moscow often?

Zhukova: No. I hadn’t been to Russia in about a decade at that point. I went my junior year of college. My father had moved back, so I went to see him. It was fun. I never in a million years would have thought about moving back to Moscow. But in my last year of college, I decided that I didn’t want to stay in L.A. I wanted a change. So I did my last semester abroad in Russia.

Blasberg: And you liked it?

Zhukova: I did. And I debated moving to Moscow permanently. But I had started this clothing company [Kova & T, a Los Angeles–based line] with my friend Christina [Tang]. I had met Christina in middle school, and we had been friends the entire time I lived in California.

Blasberg: Did people discourage you from doing a clothing line?

Zhukova: Completely. Actually, I feel like anything I’ve ever done, I’ve been strongly advised not to do.

Blasberg: By people in the industry? Or by friends?

Zhukova: Everyone. It was more people telling me, “You don’t want to get into this industry. You don’t know what you’re getting yourself into. You don’t want to make this your future.”

Blasberg: You didn’t listen to them, I see. So you’re doing this business from L.A. and Moscow. How did you get to London then?

Zhukova: I knew I wanted to do something in the medical field, so I moved to London to study homeopathic medicine. England has a long history of supporting alternative medicine—maybe it’s because they don’t have such a strong pharmaceutical industry in England, and homeopathy has been taught and promoted there for hundreds of years. So I moved to London, but I was going back to Moscow a lot.

Blasberg: Who were you hanging out with in Moscow?

Zhukova: I was spending loads of time with my father and brothers, and I had a Russian boyfriend at the time—a tennis player. I’m not sure how it all happened, but a few years later, minus that boyfriend and plus a new one, I started living in London full-time.

Blasberg: A new boyfriend always helps. Is that the current boyfriend, Roman Abramovich? You met him in London?

Zhukova: I had known him for some time.

Blasberg: Where does he live?

Zhukova: Moscow.