Donna Karan (DKNY)
Donna Karan is an American Jewish fashion designer and the founder of Donna Karan New York and DKNY clothing labels. Karan was born as Ivy Faske on October 2nd, 1948 in Forest Hills, Queens, USA. After college, Karan began her career as an assistant designer with Anne Klein in the late 1960s, where she was eventually promoted to associate designer in 1971. As Anne Klein died in 1974, Takihyo Corporation of Japan became the new owner and Karan became head designer of the house where she remained until 1985, when she and her husband started launching her eponymous Donna Karan label. They began designing “modern clothes for modern people”. Karan showed her first women’s clothing collection in 1985 and became well-known for her ‘Essentials’ line, initially offering seven easy pieces which could all be mixed and matched, and created a fully integrated wardrobe. Karan always insisted that she would only design clothes, like jersey dresses and opaque Lycra tights, that she would also wear herself. In 1988 Karan, nicknamed The Queen Of Seventh Avenue by the time, extended her women’s ‘Donna Karan New York’ line by a less expensive one for younger women, called DKNY. The line was such a hit that Karan can be regarded as the first designer to successfully establish a diffusion line. Two years later she created DKNY Jeans, a denim-inspired collection. DKNY for men was launched in 1992, one year after the ‘Signature’ line for men had been presented.
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