Previously, Del Frate was a special counsel in the London and Milan offices of K&L Gates, a consultant at Millbank Solicitors, and she spent time in private practice with Chiomenti and DLA Piper. Her expertise spans luxury retail, restaurant and entertainment, logistics, student housing, and high value residential in the UK and Italy.

Del Frate, who is dual qualified to practice in Italy and England and Wales, has built her practice representing Italian clients on cross-border property investment deals, particularly for owners, purchasers, lenders, and tenants. She also advises international institutional and private clients on investing in the European real estate market. Del Frate acts for a range of large corporates and luxury companies, including Audemars Piguet, Autry, Crazy Pizza, Gucci, Monnalisa, Rubinacci, YSL and Loro Piana.

“Chiara will be an invaluable asset to the Firm, with a client base and sector expertise that fits perfectly with our capabilities. She has deep expertise in areas such as luxury, food and beverage, and Entertainment, the living sector and high-value residential, all key focuses and sectors in which we have been advising clients for many years,” Robin Grove, divisional managing partner of Construction, Real Estate and Disputes, said. “Against a backdrop of the firm’s rapid growth in Milan, Chiara’s deep understanding of the Italian market will be invaluable as we continue to strengthen our relationships and expand our work in this space.”

Her appointment follows the opening of the firm’s Milan office in November 2024, which has grown since then from two lawyers to ten towards the end of 2025. Most recently, the firm appointed corporate, fintech, IP and art law expert Annapaola Negri-Clementi to join the Milan office in October 2025.

Del Frate’s appointment also follows a number of other appointments in the Construction, Real Estate and Disputes division. – Josh Risso-Gill, partner, and Kevin Gibbs, senior consultant, joined the Planning, Infrastructure and Environment team in April 2025 and January 2025 respectively.

Vontobel
Zurich-headquartered has appointed Dominik Kremer, with immediate effect, as head of distribution Germany and Austria and head of branch for the Frankfurt office. He reports to Marie Jacot, global head of distribution of Edmond de Rothschild Asset Management.

Kremer has more 30 years of extensive experience in asset management, in particular covering fundraising, global distribution, and business development. Previously, from June 2022, he was global head of sales at Haven Green Investment Management in Frankfurt. Prior to that, Kremer served as global head of business development and as a member of the executive management committee at Unigestion in Geneva and London. He has also served in various leadership roles at Columbia Threadneedle Investments in London and Frankfurt, from 2010 to 2019, most lately as head of institutional EMEA and Latin America and co-head of distribution EMEA. Kremer also spent 10 years at Pioneer Investments (UniCredit Banking Group) in Munich, Milan, and London, from December 2001 to July 2010. He started his career at Fidelity Investments in client servicing, progressively moving to senior sales and strategic roles, focusing on institutional client management and distribution strategy.

Kremer holds a postgraduate diploma in business administration from Manchester Business School and degrees in arts and law from the University of Stellenbosch, South Africa.