The Feeling is Mutual
by Linda Mark
Stephen Robert and Pilar Crespi discovered that they had a mutual passion for philanthropy when they met in 1996 on a blind date in New York. Yet nothing happened for two months. Stephen wasn’t sure that Pilar liked him.
But when the principal owner of Oppenheimer & Co., who also served as chancellor of his alma mater, Brown University, ran into the friend who’d introduced them, he was encouraged to call Pilar again.
“I liked Steve,” says Pilar, the former New York model, fashion coordinator for the designer Valentino in Rome, and public relations professional. “I was on the board of the Henry Street Settlement, which provides vital services to more than 60,000 New Yorkers each year. Steve and I discussed our interest in giving back and discovered that we had many of the same values.”