--- title: TIME100 Philanthropy: Francine A. LeFrak description: Find out why Francine A. LeFrak is on the TIME100 Most Influential People in Philanthropy 2025 list. canonical: https://time.com/collections/time100-philanthropy-2025/7286011/francine-a-lefrak/ article:content_tier: free article:published_time: 2025-05-20T11:32:26.000Z article:modified_time: 2026-03-03T00:49:07.967Z og:title: TIME100 Philanthropy: Francine A. LeFrak og:description: Find out why Francine A. LeFrak is on the TIME100 Most Influential People in Philanthropy 2025 list. og:url: https://time.com/collections/time100-philanthropy-2025/7286011/francine-a-lefrak/ og:site_name: TIME og:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt016a718d05890d70/6998c6b71500fbf26aaa6435/T100PHIL-Innov-Francine-A-LeFrak.jpg?branch=production&width=3840&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=16:9 og:image:width: 1200 og:image:height: 675 og:image:alt: TIME100 Philanthropy: Francine A. LeFrak og:type: article twitter:card: summary_large_image twitter:title: TIME100 Philanthropy: Francine A. LeFrak twitter:description: Find out why Francine A. LeFrak is on the TIME100 Most Influential People in Philanthropy 2025 list. twitter:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt016a718d05890d70/6998c6b71500fbf26aaa6435/T100PHIL-Innov-Francine-A-LeFrak.jpg?branch=production&width=3840&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=16:9 --- May 20, 2025 # Francine A. LeFrak Wellness for women by Peter Carbonara  Michael Ostuni—Patrick McMullan/Getty Images Francine LeFrak, whose [family](https://www.forbes.com/profile/lefrak/) oversees one of the biggest real estate companies in the New York City tri-state area, focuses her philanthropy on women,using an approach that she calls the “three pillars” of wellness: physical, mental, and financial. The latest example of her largesse: the Francine A. LeFrak Foundation Center for Well-Being at Barnard College, completed last year ahead of its official opening this June. The state-of-the-art facility, which cost $36 million to build (LeFrak’s foundation was the lead donor), offers behavioral and physical fitness services and financial literacy training to both students and college staff at the women’s college. The year before the foundation took a similar approach in New Jersey financing a wellness center in Jersey City that provides vocational training, medical services, and micro-grants to women involved in the court system. LeFrak, who hopes to replicate the Barnard wellness center at other colleges, says she developed her three-pillars approach in 2007 after working with Rwandan women who were supporting themselves by selling handmade jewelry and housewares after surviving the country’s 1994 genocide. “Talent is everywhere, opportunity isn’t,” says LeFrak, a 2019 Giving Pledge signatory. “The dignity of work is the best philanthropy.” **_Correction, May 20:_** _The original version of this story misstated the official opening date of the Francine A. LeFrak Foundation Center for Well-Being. It is June 2025, not June 2024._ ```json [{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"Article","@id":"https://time.com/collections/time100-philanthropy-2025/7286011/francine-a-lefrak/","mainEntityOfPage":{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https://time.com/collections/time100-philanthropy-2025/7286011/francine-a-lefrak/"},"headline":"Francine A. LeFrak","datePublished":"2025-05-20T11:32:26.000Z","dateModified":"2026-03-03T00:49:07.967Z","description":"","url":"https://time.com/collections/time100-philanthropy-2025/7286011/francine-a-lefrak/","keywords":["list","franchise"],"thumbnailUrl":"https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt016a718d05890d70/6998c6b71500fbf26aaa6435/T100PHIL-Innov-Francine-A-LeFrak.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=1200:675&height=675","author":[{"@type":"Person","name":"TIME Staff","jobTitle":null,"url":"https://time.com/author/time-staff/"}],"creator":"TIME Staff","articleSection":"","image":[{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt016a718d05890d70/6998c6b71500fbf26aaa6435/T100PHIL-Innov-Francine-A-LeFrak.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=1200:675&height=675","width":1200,"height":675}],"publisher":{"@type":"Organization","name":"Time","url":"https://time.com/","logo":{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://time.com/images/logo.png","width":528,"height":156},"foundingDate":"March 3, 1923","sameAs":["https://www.facebook.com/time","https://www.instagram.com/time/?hl=en","https://twitter.com/time","https://www.pinterest.com/timemagazine"]}},{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"BreadcrumbList","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"item":{"@id":"https://time.com/collections/time100-philanthropy-2025/7286011/francine-a-lefrak/","name":"Francine A. LeFrak"}}]}] ```