Diane von Furstenberg Biography
Diane von Fürstenberg is a famous Belgian fashion designer who is best known for her wrap dress. Her fashion label, Diane von Furstenberg (DvF), is sold in over 70 countries and has 45 standalone stores worldwide, with its headquarters and flagship boutique in Manhattan’s Meatpacking District.
How old is Diane von Furstenberg? – Age
She is 75 years old as of 31 December 2021. She was born in 1946 in Brussels, Belgium. Her real name is Diane Simone Michele Halfin.
Diane von Furstenberg Family – Education
Her parents were both Jewish. Her father, Leon (Lipa) Halfin, was born in Bessarabia and moved to Belgium from Chişinău in 1929, later seeking refuge from the Nazis in Switzerland. Her mother was Thessaloniki-born Greek-born Liliane Nahmias, a Holocaust survivor who was initially captured by the Nazis while a member of the Resistance during World War II. Her mother was a prisoner at Auschwitz concentration camp for 18 months before Fürstenberg was born. Fürstenberg has spoken widely about her mother’s influence on her life, praising her for teaching her that “fear is not an option.” She went to an Oxfordshire boarding school. She attended Madrid University before transferring to the University of Geneva to pursue a degree in economics.
Is Diane Von Furstenberg still married? – Husband
She is married. She has been married to American media mogul Barry Diller since 2001. When she was 18, she met Prince Egon von Fürstenberg, the elder son of German Roman Catholic prince Prince Tassilo zu Fürstenberg (1903-1987), and his first wife, Clara Agnelli, an heiress to the Fiat automotive fortune and member of the Italian nobility. The couple married in 1969.
Although the Fürstenbergs’ marriage was unpopular with the groom’s family due to the bride’s Jewish ethnicity, it was regarded as dynastic, and she became Her Serene Highness Princess Diane of Fürstenberg upon her marriage. However, she lost any claim to the title after their divorce in 1983 and their divorce in 1972.
Does Diane von Fürstenberg have children?
She has two children from her marriage to Prince Egon; businessman and socialite Prince Alexander von Fürstenberg, born on 25 January 1970 and art curator, singer-songwriter, actress, philanthropist, and filmmaker Princess Tatiana Desirée von Fürstenberg, born on 16 February 1971. She is now the grandmother of five children; Talita von Fürstenberg, Antonia Steinberg, Tassilo Egon Maximilian, Leon von Fürstenberg, and Vito von Fürstenberg.
How tall is Diane Von Furstenberg?
She stands at a height of 5 feet and 8 inches.
What is the Net Worth of Diane Von Furstenberg?
She has an estimated net worth of $300 million.
Where does Diane von Furstenberg live now? – Home
She lives in Manhattan’s Meatpacking District, in a glass-and-steel aerie that the occupant refers to as her “tree house.” The isolation of the high perch, however, is deceiving. Beyond its glass walls, the city’s old and new icons vie for attention: to the northeast, the majestic Empire State Building, and to the west, the High Line, a mile-and-a-half-long park built atop abandoned elevated train tracks and championed by Von Furstenberg. And all around is an edgy, bubbly quarter exuding equal parts glitz and grit.
The penthouse is the crowning achievement of a six-story, 35,000-square-foot structure that houses Von Furstenberg’s design studio and flagship store. It is the latest in a series of unique personal spaces that began with a baronial Park Avenue apartment.
Diane von Furstenberg Career
She met high-profile Vogue editor Diana Vreeland after moving to New York, who called her designs “absolutely smashing.” She saw her name on the Fashion Calendar for New York Fashion Week and decided to start her own business. She introduced the knitted jersey “wrap dress” in 1974, which became an iconic piece in women’s fashion and is now housed in the Costume Institute of the Metropolitan Museum of Art. According to Forbes, 25,000 dresses were sold per week soon after the launch, and one million dresses were sold by 1976. By 1979, the brand’s annual sales had surpassed $150 million. In 1976, following the success of the wrap dress, Fürstenberg was featured on the cover of Newsweek magazine.
According to the accompanying article, she is “the most marketable woman since Coco Chanel.” She debuted a cosmetic line as well as her first fragrance, “Tatiana,” named after her daughter. According to the New York Times, the company’s annual retail sales were $150 million in 1979 (equivalent to $560 million in 2021).
In 1985, Fürstenberg relocated to Paris, where she established Salvy, a French-language publishing house. Fürstenberg launched a number of other businesses, including a cosmetics line and a home-shopping service in 1991. In 1992, Fürstenberg’s Silk Assets collection sold $1.2 million (equivalent to $2.3 million in 2021) in two hours on QVC. She attributes her success to giving her the confidence to relaunch her business.
In 1997, Fürstenberg relaunched her company and reintroduced the wrap dress, which became popular with a new generation of women. The relaunch was initially a failure, but with the appointment of Paula Sutter as President of the brand, it was restored to its heyday of the mid-1970s. Diane: A Signature Life, her business memoir, was published in 1998. She debuted the DVF by H. Stern fine jewelry collection in 2004, as well as scarves and beachwear. She was elected president of the Council of Fashion Designers of America in 2006, a position she still holds today. She was honored with a star on Seventh Avenue’s Fashion Walk of Fame in 2008.
Michelle Obama appeared on the official White House Christmas card in 2009 wearing the DVF signature Chain Link print wrap dress. The same year, the Manezh, one of Moscow’s largest public exhibition spaces, hosted a large-scale retrospective exhibition titled “Diane von Furstenberg: Journey of a Dress.” Andre Leon Talley curated it, and it received a lot of media attention. The exhibition traveled to So Paulo in 2010, and to Beijing’s Pace Gallery in 2011.
Fürstenberg received a gold medal at the annual Queen Sofa Spanish Institute Gold Medal Gala in 2010. DVF debuted a home collection and a signature fragrance, Diane, in 2011. Fürstenberg debuted her first children’s collection with GapKids in 2012, as well as a denim collaboration with Current/Elliott.
Catherine, Duchess of Cambridge, Gwyneth Paltrow, Kate Beckinsale, Madonna, Tina Brown, Jessica Alba, Susan Sarandon, Priyanka Chopra, Jennifer Lopez, and Whitney Houston have all worn her designs. Google Glass debuted at the designer’s Spring 2013 fashion show during New York Fashion Week. In 2014, Fürstenberg became a spokesperson for the Ban Bossy campaign, which promotes female leadership roles. She also published The Women I Wanted to Be, an autobiography that delves into her personal life and upbringing.
Between 2017 and 2019, the brand lost nearly $80 million, resulting in the layoff of 75 percent of the workforce in the United States in May 2020. Sales had dropped from $300 million before the 2008 recession to $150 million by 2018. After a PETA exposé revealed workers mutilating and killing goats to obtain mohair, the brand banned its use in 2018. Fur, angora, and exotic skins were also prohibited in future collections. DVF permanently closed 18 of its 19 stores in the United States in 2020.
