Ivana Trump. Photo: author named on the file page, CC BY-SA 3.0, via Wikimedia Commons: https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Ivana_Trump_cropped_retouched.jpg
School period
College/University
Gallery of Ivana Trump
Charles University. Photo: Stanislav Dusík, CC BY-SA 4.0, via Wikimedia Commons (https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Praha,_Univerzita_Karlova_-_Karolinum.jpg)
Gallery of Ivana Trump
McGill University. Photo: D. Benjamin Miller, CC0, via Wikimedia Commons (https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Arts_Building,_McGill_University,_Aug_31_2022.jpg)
Career
Gallery of Ivana Trump
Eaton's. Photo: Photographer unknown. Published by the T. Eaton Co. Limited., Public domain, via Wikimedia Commons (https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Eaton%27s_Spring_and_Summer_Catalogue_1942.jpg)
Gallery of Ivana Trump
The Trump Organization. Photo: Supercarwaar, CC BY-SA 3.0, via Wikimedia Commons (https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Trump_Tower_-_front.JPG)
Charles University. Photo: Stanislav Dusík, CC BY-SA 4.0, via Wikimedia Commons (https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Praha,_Univerzita_Karlova_-_Karolinum.jpg)
McGill University. Photo: D. Benjamin Miller, CC0, via Wikimedia Commons (https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Arts_Building,_McGill_University,_Aug_31_2022.jpg)
Eaton's. Photo: Photographer unknown. Published by the T. Eaton Co. Limited., Public domain, via Wikimedia Commons (https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Eaton%27s_Spring_and_Summer_Catalogue_1942.jpg)
Ivana Trump was a Czech-born American businesswoman, model, writer, and media personality. After working in Canada as a ski instructor and model, she became a senior executive in the Trump Organization and later developed independent fashion, beauty, publishing, and television ventures. She also wrote books and the long-running “Ask Ivana” advice column.
Background
Ivana Marie Zelníčková was born on February 20, 1949, in Gottwaldov, now Zlín in the Czech Republic, to electrical engineer Miloš Zelníček and telephone operator Marie Zelníčková. She was raised in a Catholic household. Her father encouraged her to ski from the age of four, and she later joined a junior national ski team in Czechoslovakia.
She lived within the Czechoslovak Socialist Republic during the Cold War, when travel beyond the country's political boundaries was restricted. Her skiing provided opportunities to travel, while her later move to Canada marked a transition from Central European sporting and educational life to North American work in instruction and fashion.
In 1971 she married Austrian ski instructor Alfred Winklmayr and obtained an Austrian passport in March 1972. The marriage ended by absentee divorce in Los Angeles in August 1973. After the death of lyricist and playwright Jiří Štaidl in 1973, she moved to Canada, where she lived in Montreal with George (Jiří) Syrovátka and worked as a ski instructor and model.
Education
Ivana studied at Charles University in Prague and completed a master's degree in physical education. The university, founded in 1348, is one of Central Europe's historic institutions of higher learning and was the principal setting for her academic training in Czechoslovakia.
While living in Montreal, she continued improving her English through night courses at McGill University. Founded in 1821, McGill was an established Canadian research university whose bilingual city's educational environment gave her access to further language study while she worked as an instructor and model.
Ivana worked as a ski instructor in Montreal after moving to Canada, and she also pursued modeling. Her clients included Eaton's department store and designer Auckie Sanft; she additionally undertook promotional modeling connected with the 1976 Summer Olympics in Montreal. During this period she described modeling as a job rather than a permanent career.
After meeting Donald Trump in New York in 1976, she joined the expanding Trump business empire. She served as a senior executive for seven years, including executive vice president for interior design, and led the interior design of Trump Tower in Manhattan, noted for its pink marble. She also held chief executive and presidential roles at Trump Castle Hotel and Casino in Atlantic City and managed the Plaza Hotel in Manhattan. Her work intersected with major hotel, casino, and real-estate projects including the Grand Hyatt renovation and the Trump Taj Mahal Casino Resort.
Following her 1990 divorce, Ivana developed independent lines of clothing, fashion jewelry, and beauty products sold through the Home Shopping Network and QVC in the United Kingdom. She presided over The House of Ivana, a fashion and fragrance company with a Park Avenue showroom, and pursued business interests in Croatia, including a minority stake in the daily newspaper Polo+10. Proposed condominium projects included Ivana Las Vegas, which was never built, while the Ivana-branded Bentley Bay development in Miami entered bankruptcy in 2004.
Ivana also built a public career in writing and broadcasting. She wrote the “Ask Ivana” advice column for Globe from 1995 to 2010, contributed to Divorce Magazine in 2001, and launched Ivana's Living in Style in 1999. She appeared on television programs including The Oprah Winfrey Show, Wogan, and 20/20; hosted the 2006 reality special Ivana Young Man; and placed seventh on Celebrity Big Brother 7 in 2010. Her screen appearances included a cameo in The First Wives Club.
(Self-help book addressing recovery from divorce and rebui...)
1995
Religion
Ivana Trump was raised in a Catholic household and remained associated with Catholic tradition. Catholicism is the largest tradition within Christianity and emphasizes the sacraments, the authority of the church, and continuity with historic Christian teaching.
Her funeral took place at the Church of St. Vincent Ferrer in Manhattan, a Catholic church near her home. The ceremony connected her public life in New York with the religious tradition of her upbringing.
Views
Ivana's post-divorce writing and public advice emphasized independence, resilience, and rebuilding one's life after personal upheaval. Her 1995 self-help book presented coping with divorce and renewed enjoyment of life as central concerns, while her later advice column addressed relationships and everyday personal decisions.
Quotations:
“Don’t get mad, get everything.”
Personality
A 2018 review described Ivana as charismatic, highly driven, career-oriented, and an equal working partner in her marriage to Donald Trump.
Quotes from others about the person
A review of the 2018 documentary miniseries Trump: An American Dream characterized Ivana as “a charismatic workaholic, a career woman, an equal.”
Interests
Fashion, beauty, travel, skiing, and writing.
Sport & Clubs
Skiing
Connections
Ivana married Alfred Winklmayr in 1971 and divorced him in 1973. She married Donald Trump on April 9, 1977, at Marble Collegiate Church in New York, and they divorced in December 1990. Their children were Donald Jr., born in 1977; Ivanka Marie, known as Ivanka, born in 1981; and Eric, born in 1984. She later married Italian businessman Riccardo Mazzucchelli in 1995; they divorced in 1997.
Ivana married Italian actor and model Rossano Rubicondi on April 12, 2008, at Mar-a-Lago, with their daughter Ivanka as maid of honor. The marriage ended in divorce in less than a year, although their relationship continued intermittently until 2019. Rubicondi died in 2021. Ivana also maintained documented relationships with lyricist and playwright Jiří Štaidl and Italian aristocrat Count Roffredo Gaetani dell'Aquila d'Aragona Lovatelli, who died in 2005.
She had ten grandchildren. Her father, Miloš Zelníček, died of a heart attack in 1990. Ivana died on July 14, 2022, in her Upper East Side home after sustaining blunt-impact injuries to the torso in a fall. She was buried at Trump National Golf Club Bedminster in New Jersey.
Father:
Miloš Zelníček
He was an electrical engineer and died of a heart attack in 1990.
Mother:
Marie Zelníčková
She worked as a telephone operator.
husband:
Alfred Winklmayr
He was an Austrian ski instructor; their marriage lasted from 1971 to 1973.
husband:
Donald Trump
They were married from 1977 to 1990 and worked together on Trump Organization projects.
Son:
Donald Trump Jr.
He was born in 1977.
Daughter:
Ivanka Trump
She was born in 1981 and served as maid of honor at Ivana Trump's 2008 wedding.
Son:
Eric Trump
He was born in 1984.
Partner:
Jiří Štaidl
He was a lyricist and playwright who died in a car accident in 1973.
Partner:
George (Jiří) Syrovátka
He owned a ski boutique in Montreal and had emigrated to Canada in 1971.
husband:
Riccardo Mazzucchelli
They married in 1995 and divorced in 1997.
Partner:
Roffredo Gaetani dell'Aquila d'Aragona Lovatelli
He was an Italian aristocrat whose relationship with Ivana Trump continued until his death in 2005.
husband:
Rossano Rubicondi
He was an Italian actor and model; they married in 2008 and divorced less than a year later.
References
Raising Trump
Autobiographical book by Ivana Trump, published by Gallery Books.
2017
Film Talk
Book by Robert Cettl published by Wider Screenings.
