Opulent, Flexible Designs Make a Wardrobe to Fit the Times
Forget the rhetoric about the women’s movement. New York designer Donna Karan has defined it all in cloth.
In her startlingly streamlined first collection under her own label, Karan faces certain truths most colleagues have ignored.
She does not pay homage to the overdressed set with apartment-size closets and time to kill. They are, in her view, a dying breed.
Instead, the former Anne Klein designer deals with hard-working, upwardly mobile, family-oriented women like herself. And she passes on to them what she has learned: that large wardrobes are obsolete; that uniforms of one sort or another are in our crystal balls; that time is more important than money; that money is best spent to produce comfort and save time.
And, despite all of the above, that true elegance will never go out of style.
Thus it was not “fashion as usual” at the Donna Karan show at Saks Fifth Avenue last Thursday night, even though the “usual” social crowd was there, ingesting the “usual” drinks and hors d’oeuvres.
There was a certain electricity in the air because many knew that Karan’s unorthodox business venture was already a staggering success, the fashion box office equal of “E.T.’s” first week in release.
Two days earlier at Bergdorf Goodman in New York, she’d racked
up record sales of $200,000 worth of Karans within 48 hours after the show, creating a bargain-basement atmosphere in that usually unflappable store.
A day before, at I. Magnin in San Francisco, $125,000 worth of Karans were sold within four hours. In the retail world, a $35,000 tally after a designer’s show is considered excellent.
In addition, Karan had already rated raves in the fashion press and a full-page article in the July 1 issue of Newsweek.
It was time for Los Angeles to find out what all the excitement is about. And the benefit audience--composed of patrons of the L. A. County Museum’s Costume Council and Saks’ “preferred customers”--was in for a surprise. Those who expected a traditional, knock-’em-dead fashion extravaganza instead got Karan’s “lessons in modern life.”
In the 36-year-old designer’s own words, “all this has nothing to do with fashion. The last thing I worry about is clothes.”
In fact, her building-block wardrobe, which fits together like pieces in a Lego set, is meant to eliminate such worries for sophisticated women on the move. It is more akin to a flexible black-and-white uniform, which one assembles from a selection of opulent parts.
The basic “building block” is a black body suit, in jewel-neck or turtleneck style. (At $90, it is the lowest-priced item in her collection. The most expensive is a $2,000 gold lame blouse).
Before you reject the “discomfort” of the body suit idea, you have to understand this is no ordinary leotard. Karan has engineered it of luxury cloth (jersey or cashmere for fall) so you “don’t even know you’re wearing it,” she says. It has dolman sleeves, shoulder pads, snap crotch, extra-long sleeves that crush up like the most luxurious sweater. And most importantly, it provides the perfect “first layer” beneath everything else: satin blouses, featherweight cashmere or wool wrap skirts, tube skirts, pleated pants, jackets and coats. Or even beneath her gold lame sarong evening skirts and assorted leather pieces.
The collection is startling because it is so elegant and flexible. Almost any piece can be worn with any other. And every piece seems designed for a minimum of weight and bulk.
The wrap-style skirts are cut on Karan’s “secret” bias pattern, which she says gives even heavy-hipped women the illusion of slinky curves.
Jackets, sleek and slim, are offered in different proportions for women of different builds. Stockings and jewelry are part of the designer’s package, so you don’t have to think twice about how to accessorize. In fact, Karan believes that as clothing wardrobes get smaller, accessories wardrobes will get bigger. Shoes, jewelry, belts, stockings will put the excitement in fashion life.
The right Karan pieces, selected carefully, could constitute a wardrobe for an entire working winter, a few months in Europe, a hectic day-night schedule that even includes formal wear. But only if you really believe that less is more. And only if you admire a certain classic, international style.
In an interview before the show, Karan explained that she based her collection on her own supersonic way of life. And although she knows her particular look is not for every working woman, she thinks her concept certainly is.
“I have a husband, a child, I work hard, I go out a lot, I haven’t a minute to spare for clothes, nor do I really want one. I love my life the way it is.” In other words, this is not a collection for the put-upon woman who hates the burdens of “liberation” and wishes she had more time to shop, more outfits to accessorize and maintain.
It’s for achievers with split-second schedules, immersed in families and careers, who want to look good without putting too much time or energy into clothes. For these want-it-all women, Karan believes, 1985 is the millennium. The only problem has been: how to dress for it.
Karan says this particular problem is what led her to leave Anne Klein (where she designed with Louis Dell’Olio) after 18 years and go out on her own. With all the beautiful items she’d designed and stockpiled season after season, she “never had anything to wear.” She had to stop and think each day (and night) about what to put on. Then she had to carry her evening outfit to her daytime job, or go home and change from stem to stern, and then manage the care and feeding of all those extravagant clothes.
She says she “went crazy” before each European trip and on days when she had to dress for her own business meetings as well as her daughter’s Girl Scout meetings and her sculptor-husband’s gallery openings.
She realized that the uniform--composed of easy, portable pieces--was an idea whose time had come. Karan got financial backing from the owners of Anne Klein and set up shop. “It’s the scariest thing I’ve ever done,” Karan says, “because I had no idea whether the women of this country would understand what I was trying to do.” Judging from early returns, they do.
