Leva Bonaparte wears two hats as a cast member on both Southern Charm and Southern Hospitality, but how does she balance it all?
The restaurateur chatted exclusively with The Daily Dish in December about how she manages her role as the owner of Republic Garden & Lounge and as part of the Charleston friend group on Southern Charm.
"I think I have really good tools called compartmentalizing, since I have this crazy stuff I have to work with all the time," she explained, before sharing how she's gotten so good at keeping things separate. "I think that my work just the bar, restaurant business innately is so dramatic that I think I might just have more tools than the regular person."
Leva also noted that she's "not necessarily always in the fray" on Southern Charm, and that she "might get the brunt of the fray" on Southern Hospitality, but she's not directly involved in the drama there, either.
"I mean, maybe that's what it is," she said.
Whatever the reason is that she largely stays out of the drama, one thing has always been clear: Don't bring any of it home.
"I put [the shows], genuinely, in a box and on a shelf when I come home. I've had to learn that that tool [because] I work with my husband, [Lamar Bonaparte]. I always say, if you cannot have really big boundaries with stuff, our marriage would age in dog years, you know," she concluded. "Like, it's not easy."
Leva Bonaparte shares an update on her marriage to Lamar Bonaparte
As Leva herself said, she mixes business with pleasure as she co-owns all of her bars and restaurants with her husband of 11 years, Lamar. In addition to Republic Garden & Lounge, Leva and Lamar own Lamar's Sporting Club, Mesu, Bourbon N' Bubbles, and Zachary's Daquiris together in Charleston.
In her chat with The Daily Dish, she revealed the secret to making their dynamic work.
"You gotta leave stuff at the door. You gotta leave work at work,' she said about her husband, who she shares son Lamar Jr. aka "Little" with. "You gotta really just be like, 'Ah, you know what, I have a lot to say right now, but we're on a date night,' or, 'I have a lot to say right now, but I'm watching a movie with my son.' ... So I think that that's healthy to a certain extent."
-Reporting by Stephanie Gomulka
