The Daily and Lagos Toast Lydia Fenet and Her Bestselling Book “The Most Powerful Woman in the Room Is You”

by Charles Manning July 29, 2019

written by Charles Manning July 29, 2019

Gretchen Maul, Olivia Caputo, Lydia Fenet, Krystal Bick, Pooja Kharbanda (Romke Hoogwaerts)

On Saturday afternoon, The Daily and Lagos hosted an al fresco luncheon at The Maidstone in East Hampton to celebrate author, auctioneer, and philanthropist, Lydia Fenet and her bestselling book, “The Most Powerful Woman in the Room Is You.”

: (Romke Hoogwaerts)

: Lydia Fenet (Wil Weiss)

(Will Weiss)

Before the meal, guests including Krystal Bick, Sophie Sumner, Olivia Caputo, Gretchen Maul, Cece Barfield Thompson, and Pooja Kharbanda enjoyed glasses of Whispering Angel rosé while trying on jewelry from Lagos’ latest collection. A few people even braved The Maidstone’s trampoline!

: Krystal Bick, Olivia Caputo (Romke Hoogwaerts)

: Sophie Sumner (Romke Hoogwaerts)

(Romke Hoogwaerts)

Once guests were seated for lunch, the woman of the hour, Lydia Fenet, gave a short inspirational speech urging all those gathered to dream big and encourage those around them to dream big, too. “So many people have asked me why I wrote a book called ‘The Most Powerful Woman in the Room Is You,'” said Fenet. “I’ve been an auctioneer since I was 24 years old and, as I often say, the funny thing about being an auctioneer when you’re 24 years old is that nobody believes you are an auctioneer, and so you kind of question it yourself. What am I doing? I don’t look like an auctioneer is supposed to look. I don’t feel like I have this voice or this confidence in my voice. I’m just standing up here repeating what I’ve seen other people do.

Lydia Fenet (Romke Hoogwaerts)

“But over a 16-year journey, I feel like I’ve honed my voice and I now have such confidence in my voice that I’ll go onto any stage in America — and if you’ve ever been to a charity auction, this you will know — and I have no problem asking anyone for anything. And I feel like that’s really what this book is about. It’s about teaching women who [would otherwise say] — because I hear it all the time — ‘I could never do your job. I could never do that. I have children, I have this, I have that.’ And I’m like, That should not stand in your way.

“David Hockney said that ‘the world is only as large as your mind can create’ and I have found that to be so true with this book. I, for years, said I could never write a book. How could I do that? I have all this stuff going on. But no! I wrote a book and now the world is so much bigger than it was even last year. So the entire premise of this book is about you finding your own inspiration and going after your dreams in a big way. Don’t look from left to right to see what other people think, look within, because it’s all there within you and once you realize that, you will be completely unstoppable.”