Elizabeth Taylor was well-known for receiving extravagant gifts from her seven husbands, but the Hollywood icon was also generous towards her friends.
The legendary actress and AIDS activist, one of the final icons of Hollywood’s golden era, passed away in 2011 at the age of 79. Her estate has been featured in two new documentaries that explore her life and legacy, titled “Elizabeth Taylor: The Lost Tapes” for HBO and “Elizabeth Taylor: Rebel Superstar,” produced by Kim Kardashian. The estate has also introduced an apparel line.
Tim Mendelson, her longtime executive assistant and friend, shared with Fox News Digital that Taylor enjoyed giving extravagant gifts.
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Elizabeth Taylor got married to her last husband at Michael Jackson’s Neverland Ranch. (KMazur/WireImage/Getty Images)
“In 1991, she got married to a man she met at the Betty Ford Center, which you’re not supposed to do, but they fell in love,” said Mendelson, referring to Taylor’s last husband, Larry Fortensky.
“They married at Michael Jackson’s Neverland Ranch,” Mendelson shared. “As a thank-you gift, she gave him an elephant named Gypsy.”
“Sure, she got people cars, but she presented that elephant to Michael Jackson at Neverland Ranch as a surprise,” Mendelson chuckled.
Elizabeth Taylor’s granddaughter Naomi Wilding, left, Dame Elizabeth Taylor and her assistant Tim Mendelson (J. Vespa/WireImage/Getty Images)
In return, Taylor received a titanium elephant purse.
When it came to her family, Taylor loved spoiling them, too. And if they inherited her dazzling eyes, they got a special collection from her.
“She had these amazing blue eyes that people always said were violet,” Mendelson explained. “Both her sons and her brother Howard had these dazzling turquoise blue eyes. She would always buy them the best cashmere sweaters to match their eyes. And they needed to be the softest cashmere sweaters. They must have had a whole shelf in their closet full of that color because of their eyes.”
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“She wasn’t afraid to push the pocketbook to give someone the perfect gift that would only come from her,” he shared. “If someone lost a dog, she was the first to get them a new pet. Dog, cat, whatever animal they wanted – she would give them one.”
If anyone wanted to impress the movie star, they simply had to give her jewels. Mendelson recalled how one of Taylor’s favorite pastimes was to have him fetch her boxes containing her various diamonds, just to look at them.
“She had a jewelry closet,” Mendelson recalled. “She was like a little girl admiring her gifts. And she absolutely had beautiful pieces, especially from the two great loves of her life – Mike Todd and Richard Burton.”
Elizabeth Taylor showing off some of the many diamonds Richard Burton gave her. (Keystone-France/Gamma-Keystone via Getty Images)
“She had a lot of sentimental pieces from [Burton],’ Mendelson added about the man Taylor married twice.
According to Taylor’s website, Burton showered her with “just because” presents over the years. During their affair in Rome, while bringing the 1963 film “Cleopatra” to life, he often took her shopping for emeralds and diamonds.
“I can’t deny that Richard gave me some spectacular gifts on birthdays and Christmas, but in truth, he was so romantic that he’d use any excuse to give me a piece of jewelry,” Taylor recalled in her book, “My Love Affair with Jewelry.”
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Elizabeth Taylor married – and divorced – her “Cleopatra” co-star Richard Burton twice. (Frank Edwards/Fotos International/Getty Images)
“He’d give me ‘It’s Tuesday, I love you’ presents,” Taylor wrote. “’It’s a beautiful day’ presents. ‘Let’s go for a walk. I want to buy you something’ presents. Over the years, I’ve come to think of these as my, ‘It’s Tuesday, I love you’ jewelry. And I never knew when he would come up with the most extraordinary ring or something very sweet and simple.”
It was also Burton who bought her several of her magnificent jewels, including the pear-shaped 69-carat diamond that came to be called the Burton-Taylor Diamond. She later auctioned it off to fund a hospital in Botswana.
Taylor would go on to possess one of the most important private collections of jewelry in America,
