Diane von Furstenberg today at the Wilshire May Company Building. Top photos by Iris Schneider.
For an exhibition celebrating 40 years of her iconic wrap dress, New York fashion designer Diane von Furstenberg chose Los Angeles. "LA is very much pop culture and this dress is pop culture," she said Friday. "There's a lot of excitement and fashion in LA right now." The cotton jersey dress wrapped in front, tied at the waist and was easy to launder — it was a drip-dry garment. The simplicity enabled career women to dress well quickly and the wrap dress became a staple of countless closets. "It paid for everything: My children's education, my freedom," von Furstenberg said. "It gave me my fame and the American dream."
Today's unveiling of the exhibition in the Wilshire May Company Building — future home of the academy's film museum — provided a bona fide LA fashion moment. Vogue editor Anna Wintour attended. Tonight there's a red carpet launch party for von Furstenberg's fashion and movie friends. She's in the club. "At 28 I fell in love with Barry Diller [they are married now]. I slept with a few movie stars along the way. My dress was in many movies. My life is a movie. Every life is a movie, that's why we love Hollywood."
The show opens Saturday and runs until April 1.
Entrance to von Furstenberg exhibition by Judy Graeme.