Diane von Furstenberg
Diane von Furstenberg was born in Brussels metropolitan area, Brussels-Capital Region, Belgium on December 31st, 1946 and is the Fashion Designer. At the age of 77, Diane von Furstenberg biography, profession, age, height, weight, eye color, hair color, build, measurements, education, career, dating/affair, family, news updates, and networth are available.
At 77 years old, Diane von Furstenberg has this physical status:
A year after marrying, Fürstenberg began designing women's clothes: "The minute I knew I was about to be Egon's wife, I decided to have a career. I wanted to be someone of my own, and not just a plain little girl who got married beyond her deserts." After the Fürstenbergs separated in 1973, Egon also became a fashion designer. After moving to New York, she met high-profile Vogue editor Diana Vreeland, who declared her designs "absolutely smashing". She had her name listed on the Fashion Calendar for New York Fashion Week, and so her business was created. She moved into an estate in Connecticut she named Cloudwalk and has lived there ever since.
In 1974, she introduced the knitted jersey "wrap dress", which became an iconic piece in women's fashion; it is included in the collection of the Costume Institute of the Metropolitan Museum of Art. Soon after the launch, 25,000 dresses were selling each week; one million dresses had been sold by 1976, according to Forbes.. After the success of the wrap dress, von Fürstenberg was featured on the cover of Newsweek magazine in 1976. The accompanying article declared her "the most marketable woman since Coco Chanel." She launched a cosmetic line and her first fragrance, "Tatiana", named after her daughter. The New York Times reported that by 1979 the annual retail sales for the company were $150 million (equivalent to $560 million in 2021).
In 1985, von Fürstenberg moved to Paris, where she founded Salvy, a French-language publishing house. She started a number of other businesses, including a line of cosmetics and a home-shopping business, which she launched in 1991. In 1992, von Fürstenberg sold $1.2 million (equivalent to $2.3 million in 2021) of her Silk Assets collection in two hours on QVC. She credits the success with giving her the confidence to relaunch her company.
Fürstenberg relaunched her company in 1997, and reintroduced the wrap dress, which gained popularity with a new generation of women. Initially, the relaunch was a failure but, with the appointment of Paula Sutter as president of the brand, it was seemingly restored to its heyday of the mid-seventies. In 1998, she published her business memoir, Diane: A Signature Life. In 2004, she introduced the DVF by H. Stern fine jewelry collection, and launched scarves and beachwear. In 2006, she was elected president of the Council of Fashion Designers of America, a position she still holds. In 2008, she received a star on Seventh Avenue's Fashion Walk of Fame.
In 2009, Michelle Obama wore the DVF signature "Chain Link" print wrap dress on the official White House Christmas card. That same year, a large-scale retrospective exhibition entitled "Diane von Furstenberg: Journey of a Dress" opened at the Manezh, one of Moscow's largest public exhibition spaces. Curated by Andre Leon Talley, it attracted media attention. In 2010, the exhibition traveled to São Paulo; and in 2011, to the Pace Gallery in Beijing.
In 2010,the designer was awarded a gold medal at the annual Queen Sofía Spanish Institute Gold Medal Gala. In 2011, DVF introduced a home collection, and a signature fragrance, Diane.
In 2012, von Fürstenberg launched her first children's collection with GapKids and a denim collaboration with Current/Elliott.
Her clothes have been worn by celebrities including Catherine, Duchess of Cambridge, Gwyneth Paltrow, Kate Beckinsale, Madonna, Tina Brown, Jessica Alba, Susan Sarandon, Priyanka Chopra, Jennifer Lopez and Whitney Houston. Google Glass made its New York Fashion Week debut at the designer's Spring 2013 fashion show.
In 2014, the designer joined the Ban Bossy campaign as a spokesperson advocating leadership roles for girls. She also released her second memoir, The Women I Wanted to Be, an autobiography which delved into her personal life and upbringing.
Between 2017 and 2019, the DVF brand lost nearly $80 million, leading to an eventual 75% of the workforce made redundant in the U.S in May 2020. By 2018, sales, which had been $300 million before the 2008 recession, were down to $150 million.
In 2018, the brand banned mohair use after a PETA exposé showed workers mutilating and killing goats to obtain it. All fur, angora and exotic skins were also banned from future collections.
In 2020, DVF closed 18 of its 19 USA stores permanently.
