Next up on the menu at Cipriani: hot potato!
Gulnara Karimova, the fashion-designing daughter of Uzbek dictator Islam Karimova booted from Mercedes-Benz Fashion Week, now aims to stage her runway show at the upscale restaurant, The Post has learned.
She’s getting heat for her alleged complicity in the brutal reign of her dad, who is accused of murdering, torturing and starving thousands of countrymen over more than 20 years.
“She is gutsy,” said a source acquainted with the jet-set autocrat, who was once described as “the most hated woman in Uzbekistan,” according to cables uncovered by WikiLeaks.
Fashion Week producer IMG has offered to refund about $30,000 in rental fees that Karimova shelled out for her show, whose total cost is estimated to be several times that.
Meanwhile, she’s put on a full-court press, completing a casting call of about 200 models in the last week alone, sources said.
The dictator’s daughter also has reached out to a number of New York embassies that represent “friendly nations” — a contingency plan in case the one for Cipriani’s doesn’t pan out, according to one source.
Karimova reps didn’t respond to requests for comment. A spokeswoman for Cipriani’s declined comment.
Nevertheless, a source yesterday said the runway show was “100 percent” slated for Cipriani’s 42nd Street location on Thursday at noon – the same time slot that had originally been given for the Lincoln Center show.