Stepping out of the shadow
Despite the mixed blessing of her famous name, Tanyatip Chearavanont intends to shape her own destiny. By Jesus Alcocer
Her life has been a continual effort to forge a path outside of her family’s “overbearing shadow”. Her name, she says, is a double-edged sword that lends her company credibility, but also leads some to discredit her efforts. “I never wanted to be seen as a cute girl without any determination,” says Tanyatip Chearavanont, the only daughter of CP Group chairman Soopakij Chearavanont, heir of the largest fortune in Southeast Asia. The 27-year-old is petite, pristine in a button-down dress that matches the stark white of her office. Most of her statements are accented by a brief but full-mouthed giggle. “You don’t have to change your personality to succeed,” she says. “I have always been quite playful and casual — the fun one.” She takes questions springily, jumping from an old essay she wrote on “a fat sidekick of Wonder Woman” to her old dream of becoming a Walt Disney animator. Her childhood, she says, was marked by The Fountainhead, a novel by Ayn Rand, the former Soviet refugee who became the standard-bearer for the most libertarian end of the political spectrum.
A TOWER SO HIGH
The Fountainhead is the story of a hardheaded idealist architect whose rejection of traditional architecture in favour of unconventional designs leads him to a series of personal tragedies. Reading the book, Ms Tanyatip says, she didn’t know she wanted to be an architect, initially aiming for a career in fine arts. However, she identified with the book’s emphasis on creativity, and on the fearless pursuit of dreams.
“When I was younger, I was very counterculture and philosophical,” she recalls. “I wanted to understand the world.”
Roark, The Fountainhead’s central character, lives for the principle that following one’s own vision is more important than worldly success. Creators, said Roark, are the fountainhead, the source of civilisation: “Everything we have, every great achievement has
come from the independent work of some independent mind. Every horror and destruction came from attempts to force men into a herd of brainless, soulless robots.”
Roark’s world crumbles as he holds steadfastly to his blueprints, until his ideas are vindicated by the downfall of his rivals. The Fountainhead closes with Roark’s wife climbing across the naked steel frames in the elevator of Roark’s Wynand skyscraper, a building so tall that only the ocean and the sky are visible at the top.
Like Roark’s, Ms Tanyatip’s path has been marked by a steadfast adhesion to her individuality, which has sometimes put her at odds with her family.
The desire to make a mark beyond the conglomerate took her first to boarding school in America — against her parents’ wishes — and then to a career in design and architecture, an industry in which the product bears the unmistakable imprint of its creator.
All roads led to this point in her career, with Ms Tanyatip preparing to launch The Strand, a 5.5-billion-baht mixed-use development at the heel of Soi Thong Lor.
The building rejects the traditional definition of “shiny and gold” luxury in favour of unabashed simplicity and functionality. The property will include smart home platforms and electric car chargers, while doing away with redundant amenities. The Strand is a statement that pushes forward the idea that real estate should be a “craft”, Ms Tanyatip says.
Her company, One.Six Development Ltd (named after the aesthetically pleasing golden ratio), is supported by a loan partially funded by her family, letting her materialise her vision of architecture without market pressures.
Not even her family is privy to the details of the project: “My grandfather asks me all the time, but I tell him to wait ... wait. I like to keep him on his toes.” Part of her secrecy, she says, stems from the desire to keep Dhanin Chearavanont as a grandfather, rather than turn him into a business guru. “When I talk to my grandfather, it’s more like, how was your day, what did you eat?”
Part of it, she says, is that both her grandfather and father are exceedingly good bosses.
Ms Tanyatip’s road to raising a towering ultra-luxury condominium has not been the hardest. “I have never had to confront something very, very difficult in my life,” she concedes. But her journey has been atypical and to a certain extent lonely.
She spent her early years in Hong Kong, where she developed a taste for art, influenced by her mother, Marisa, who delivered a Dali and other high-value paintings to the doorstep of her dorm at the University of Pennsylvania.
“I never thought I would become a businesswoman, and many of my friends would be surprised that I can have a serious business mood, too.”
Her older brother decided to stay in Hong Kong, but Ms Tanyatip decided to move to the United States at 14 to attend Choate Rosemary Hall, a top boarding school in Connecticut. “My parents were against it, because I am the only daughter, but I was very gung-ho about going to boarding school,” she says. “By the time I got there, I thought I made it, but two years after I was like this is so sad and lonely.” Boarding school, however, was one of those growing pains, “and I grew a lot through that experience”.
After Choate she matriculated at Penn, where she chose to enrol in design school, rather than in the school’s top-ranked business programme. Her family, she says, is very traditional, and “back in the day they did not allow women to enter the business”. As the only daughter and one of two granddaughters, her grandfather and father encouraged her to follow her passion, which she found was architecture, not fine arts or business.
At Penn, she declined to take part in the school’s on-campus recruiting, the process through which the vast majority of undergraduates secure employment offers, choosing instead to find her own opportunities in fields as diverse as advertising, art brokerage and architecture.
FRESH OFF THE BOAT
After eight years in the States she returned to Hong Kong, where she worked with HK Land managing the Landmark, a high-end shopping centre on the island.
Ms Tanyatip left HK Land with the intention of starting a company “right of the bat”, but she found that Hong Kong is a “really tough market” with little room for new developers. Her initial idea was to flip houses in Hong Kong, but after visiting a number of foreclosed buildings, she decided that the enterprise would not be profitable.
“I registered the company immediately, but I was naive, fresh off the boat,” she says. “That’s why I moved to Thailand: to get down and dirty with the industry.” Back home, she joined Magnolia Quality Development, led by Thippaporn Ahriyavraromp, the youngest daughter of Mr Dhanin. Ms Tanyatip says her Aunt Thippaporn has been a mentor, friend and constant support in the founding of One.Six Development.
Coming back to Thailand wasn’t easy. She had to build her social life from scratch and take time to adjust. “I have an accent when I speak Thai, it’s horrible. Google Translate is my best friend, and I constantly ask employees to translate stuff for me.”
She learned the ins and outs of the trade. Then she started talking to her aunt about how, hypothetically, she could build a development company from scratch if she had the money to do so. One.Six Development, a joint venture with Magnolia, ultimately grew from one these hypotheticals with the help of Chawin Athakravisunthorn, the great-grandson of former prime minister Pote Sarasin and a lifelong friend.
“The first thing my father told me was don’t spend money you don’t have,” she says. “Cash flow is like an oxygen tank, he said, sometimes you can see the top, but you run out of oxygen.”
Ms Tanyatip originally wanted to set up her team at Soho, a minimalist office space in Sukhumvit Soi 26, but her dad refused, telling her that if Steve Jobs started from a garage, she could make it anywhere.
“Instead, we rented the storage room up here and put in a few desks.” Her office is tucked in the corner of the top floor of Suanplern market. Its sterile interiors betray the deliberate austerity practised by its owner.
The now CEO still enjoys part of the anonymity that she had growing up in Hong Kong and US. “No one knew who we were in Hong Kong, and even now 99% of people don’t know who I am because my family is low-profile,” she says. “Well, not low-profile, but we are not in the social scene much.”
With her passion for arts, Ms Tanyatip has undertaken charitable activities with her family’s non-profit BUILD Foundation, whose goal is to help underprivileged children by building schools across the country.
She still lives at home with her parents and has no plans to marry soon; work occupies most of her day. She is in the office by 9am until dinner, when she goes home to eat with her grandmother. “I am very close to my mom, but I try to spend time with my grandmother, because all of her children are too busy.”
Aside from work, Ms Tanyatip enjoys art and ceramics, and she exercises a few times a month.
When I talk to my grandfather, it’s more like, how was your day, what did you eat? TANYATIP CHEARAVANONT ONE.SIX DEVELOPMENT CHIEF EXECUTIVE