Philanthropist Maria Manetti Shrem Supporting the Arts, Music, Education, Health & Science
On November 19, 2025, Maria Manetti Shrem will be honored at the annual An Evening on Stage gala by the San Francisco Opera Guild for her generous donations over 25 years to San Francisco Opera production and the opera education programs. This is just the newest honor for Maria, and I am an honorary host committee member.
Maria’s philanthropic endeavors far exceed the San Francisco Opera. Since 1995, I have had the pleasure of meeting her at various charity events hosted by Festival Napa Valley, the San Francisco Symphony, SF MoMa, ArtSmart, the Andrea Bocelli Foundation, and the UCSF Benioff Children’s Hospital.
In 2021 when I sold her magnificent Villa Mille Rose vineyard estate in Oakville, I asked Maria for her advice on giving, and she told me: “Give with your warm hands and get involved with the people and help them flourish with your support and donations.” Her advice inspired me to give while alive and work with the charities in which I am now actively involved.
I established the Olivia Decker Power of Music Series with a $5 million pledge in 2021 for year-round concerts with world class performers and young, talented musicians at iconic locations. I still have a long way to go to follow Maria’s long, amazing history of supporting the arts, music, education, health, and science.
Writing about Maria’s fascinating opera-worthy life would require a whole book. Her remarkable contributions started when she was a young, single woman in the early 1970s. Maria Manetti Shrem, born in Florence, Italy, relocated to San Francisco in 1972.
She played a pivotal role in the internationalization of some of the world’s most iconic fashion brands, such as Gucci, Fendi, and Mark Cross, under the umbrella brand of Manetti-Farrow Incorporated. She developed an innovative distribution system in North America, significantly expanding their global market presence.
In the early 1990s, Maria created one of the most elegant estates in Napa Valley, Villa Mille Rose, where she hosted international artists and celebrities, including Luciano Pavarotti, Sophia Loren, Renée Fleming, Plácido Domingo, Nancy Pelosi, Kamala Harris, Gavin Newsom, Isabel Allende, Marchese Piero Antinori, Paloma Picasso, Sherry Lansing, William Friedkin, and Andrea Bocelli, among others.
As a result, she established herself as the quintessential ambassador of “Made in Italy” creations and as an enduring icon of beauty, art, philanthropy, and the Italian lifestyle in the San Francisco Bay Area. She currently spends her time between San Francisco, Napa, and Florence and enjoys traveling all over the world, while continuing to learn about contemporary art, cultural heritage preservation, antiquities, and the most refined winemaking brands.
Maria and her late husband, Jan Shrem (1930-2024), have long contributed philanthropic support within the fields of education (colleges and high schools), fine arts (museums), performing art centers (operatic and symphonic concert halls), medical research (hospitals) to nonprofit organizations in the U.S., Italy, the U.K., France, Mexico, and Africa.
The Manetti Shrem Foundation currently supports over 55 charitable programs across over 40 foundations, with favorites in the U.S. including the Metropolitan Opera in New York City, UC Davis, the San Francisco Opera, Festival Napa Valley, UC Berkeley-Cal Performances, KQED, Francisco Park (community garden), the San Francisco Symphony, SF Film (naming the award for acting), SF MoMA, ArtSmart, KDFC, and hospitals such as UCSF (neurology, orthopedics, urology) and Sutter Health-CPMC (cardiology, acute care for elderly, healthy aging research program).
In Europe, Maria is one of the principal benefactors of the King’s Foundation, Royal Drawing School, American Friends of the Louvre, Teatro del Maggio Musicale Fiorentino, Museo 900, Friends of Versailles, the Venetian Heritage, the Italian National Trust (FAI), Palazzo Strozzi Foundation, and the Andrea Bocelli Foundation, with which she has supported the construction of four new schools, including the latest one at the Meyer Children’s Hospital.
The Manetti Shrems are founders and lifetime members of the Cabo Jewish Center. Maria also funded a scholarship in Africa at Global Sojourns Giving Circle to empower tomorrow’s women leaders.
The Manetti Shrems are co-founders of the Jan Shrem and Maria Manetti Shrem Museum of Art at UC Davis, which opened its doors on November 13, 2016, realizing a goal that was 60 years in the making. The museum’s collection includes works by major California artists such as Wayne Thiebaud, William T. Wiley, Robert Arneson, Roy De Forest, Ruth Horsting, Manuel Neri, and Roland Petersen.
The museum reserves 30% of its space for educational and hands-on projects. It provides a dedicated area for workshops in the Florentine Renaissance tradition of the so-called “Bottega dell’Arte,” where art students can learn by doing.
The extraordinary architectural design of the museum—which was praised in ARTnews as “One of the World’s 25 Best Museum Buildings of the Past 100 Years,” curated by New York-based architect Florian Idenburg (SO-IL)—has already won 18 awards (six from international organizations).
It is also listed as one of the nation’s top 10 teaching museums. The Manetti Shrem Museum has been selected as one of the 50 projects featured in the 2025 Venice Biennale in the U.S. Pavilion as an outspoken example of “an architecture of generosity.”
Maria Manetti Shrem has received numerous prestigious awards and recognitions as an outstanding and influential cultural ambassador, especially strengthening the relationships between the U.S. and Italy, California and Tuscany, the San Francisco Bay Area and Florence.
Maria has been honored as a cultural ambassador and philanthropist in the USA and Italy. In 2019, President Sergio Mattarella of Italy bestowed upon her the title of Grand Officer of the Order of the Star of Italy for promoting Italian culture and business in the USA.
On March 16, 2022, the mayor of Florence, Dario Nardella, awarded her the keys of the City of Florence as an inspiring role model of patronage following the Renaissance legacy of the Medici family and defining her as “the new Elettrice Palatina”—the last heiress of the Medici dynasty.
On June 22, 2022, Jan Shrem and Maria Manetti Shrem were the inaugural recipients of The Angels of the Arts Award, Festival Napa Valley’s highest honor. On the same occasion, the San Franciso Mayor London Breed, along with the county and the city, proclaimed June 22 as Manetti Shrem Day, dedicated to fostering philanthropy.
On December 3, 2022, during a celebratory event organized by SF Opera and SF Symphony, Maria–50 Years in America, the San Francisco City Hall rotunda was illuminated in the colors of the Italian flag to honor Maria’s unparalleled philanthropic activity.
At the end of the last performance of La Traviata, Maria Manetti Shrem was honored by San Francisco Opera with the highest community recognition, The Spirit of the Opera Award, presented to her on stage where she bowed hand in hand with the performers before 3,000 patrons.
On June 18, 2023, Maria Manetti Shrem was awarded the 2023 UC Davis Medal honorary degree as the most prominent patron of the arts at UC Davis. The Medal is “the highest honor the university presents to individuals in recognition of extraordinary contributions that embody the campus’ vision.”
Past honorees include former President of the United States of America Bill Clinton, painter Wayne Thiebaud, 2020 Nobel Prize winner Charles Rice, and fellow philanthropists Margrit and Robert Mondavi.
UC Berkeley recognized the Manetti Shrems as Builders of Berkeley for their consistent and relevant support to the college. In spring 2024, Maria made history by endowing the College of Letters and Science at UC Davis with its largest gift ever, establishing eight endowments to protect the arts and humanities in perpetuity.
Her visionary donation integrates arts, humanities, design, fashion and textile, creating a “Renaissance zeitgeist” through the establishment of a dedicated art district, inaugurated in January 2025.
In recognition of her global philanthropy, Maria received the 2024 Premio StellaRe from Fondazione Sandretto Re Rebaudengo in Torino, Italy. In spring 2025, Maria Manetti Shrem was presented the California Performing Arts Visionary Award for her outstanding philanthropy, specifically underwriting the first California Orchestra residency of the Vienna Philharmonic Orchestra at Cal Performances, UC Berkeley, led by guest conductor Yannick Nézet-Séguin and starring pianist Yefim Bronfman.
On the celebratory occasion of the naming of the Maria Manetti Shrem Emerging Artists Program at the Academy of Il Maggio Musicale Fiorentino, Maria was awarded the Pegaso d’Oro, the highest honor of the Region of Tuscany.Because of her impactful philanthropy, she is also a 2025 Ellis Island Medal of Honor recipient.
Maria Manetti Shrem continues to lead with vision and generosity, shaping cultural landscapes and enriching lives across the globe. I am very excited to be a member of the honorary host committee to honor her at An Evening on the Stage gala for her long-standing contributions to the San Francisco Opera. Please join me at the event on November 19. Tickets and information available at www.SFIpera.com/Stage-Dinner.