by Donna Karan
—
Fashion is evolving. There was a time when you bought an entire new wardrobe every season. Hemlines went up or the pants went narrow, and everything you owned suddenly looked wrong, wrong, wrong. Now women shop for a moment, an item that makes everything feel fresh. Today’s way of dressing makes being a fashion designer more challenging than ever. I used to advise aspiring designers to get a job in retail to understand their customer. Now I tell young designers to travel the world, even if it means backpacking and staying in hostels. Working in Haiti showed me how to be creative on a whole new level. As Anne Klein told me, you’re a designer whether you’re designing a toothbrush, a house, or a bed. I was fortunate to have a mentor, but the world can be your mentor. Go and see it. Everyone is so busy chasing fame, but the real joy and excitement come from the process.
I know that more than ever. I am a child at heart, and I love to play and create. Like a child, I’ve always felt that I have all the time in the world and so much ahead of me. But I’m older now, and I realize that time is short. The clock is ticking. I have projects to complete with Urban Zen. I have endless plans for Haiti. And then there are the places I need to see, including Cuba, Colombia, and China—yes, all countries that begin with the letter C. It’s a big world, and I want to be a part of it.
My career may have turned me into a brand, but I’m a woman first. I’m also a mother, grandmother, friend, sister, philanthropist, yogi, woman on a spiritual quest, caretaker, mentor, teacher, and student—and now I’m a writer, too. I gave birth to one child, and as a designer, I gave birth to a million ideas. I created a brand far larger than I. LVMH plans to take DKNY into the next century and beyond. As the industry and technology shift, so must the creative approach.
Changes like these are exciting—and scary, too. Like Gabby, my brand has grown up and needs to live its own life. I can’t wait to see how my legacy unfolds. I can’t wait to see how my life unfolds, too. By the time you read this, God knows where I’ll be on my personal journey (though I can promise I will finally be attending the Burning Man Festival, something I’ve never had time to do before). I’m anxious to read the sequel to this book!
—
For my sixtieth birthday, a bunch of friends took me to Lake Powell in Arizona. We rented a houseboat stocked with every water toy under the sun. Lake Powell is beautiful and enormous, and surrounded by rocky canyons, and I wanted to take out the Jet Skis. My friend Richard Baskin agreed to come, but warned me, “No matter what, Donna, we have to stay together. It’s dangerous here, and you can get lost.”
We were bobbing up and down on the Jet Skis when Richard realized he’d forgotten his sunglasses. “Don’t you dare go out on your own,” he said. But I fired up and took off anyway. Hours went by, and while I loved the freedom at first, I eventually realized I was lost. Really lost. Then I ran out of gas. The sun was setting, and I was in the middle of nowhere, no boats in sight, terrified. Right when I was starting to shiver from fear, Richard and a search party appeared and saved me.
Later that night, Richard said, “Donna, today was the perfect metaphor for how you live your life: You gun it without knowing where the fuck you’re going and hope for the best.”
He’s right. Nothing turns me on like a leap of faith. When I get an idea into my head, I go for it. I put menswear on a runway without a business to support it. I tried crazy designs that were successful and many that flopped, including my now-iconic cold shoulder. If I’d stopped and thought about half the things I wanted to do, they never would have happened. On the one hand, I hate to let go; on the other, I can’t wait to jump in. Go figure.
As extraordinary as my career has been, for all the runways and red carpets I’ve walked and the way my heart still pounds while waiting for a WWD review, it’s the small, personal moments that stand out most in my memories: Gabby smiling when I picked her up at school. Wrapping my arms around Stephan as we hit the open road on his motorcycle. Laughing with Barbra over a game of gin rummy on a boat surrounded by nothing but blue water. Playfully hitting my sister Gail on the arm when she says I remind her of our mother. Our family embracing me and Stephan on the beach at Parrot Cay when we renewed our vows. Photographing Stefania on her horse while she takes on the next hurdle; Stefania braiding my hair after a long day at work. Sebastian delighting in going with me to Haiti. Taking Polaroids of Ethiopian children who’d never seen their photos before. Going anywhere Gianpaolo steers us, whether by plane, boat, Ferrari or, like Stephan before him, by motorcycle. And of course the excitement experienced every time I step off a plane in an unfamiliar country.
I’ll never stop exploring, because it’s what I haven’t done that excites me most. That’s my journey: learning from the past, living in the present, and journeying into the future with the light as my guide. Even more important, though, is who’s by my side for the ride. Because at the end of the day, it’s not what you wear or even what you’ve accomplished that matters. It’s who you are, who you love, and how you live. To be continued.
My parents, Helen aka “Queenie” and Gabby Faske
Me at three months
With my sister Gail, who has always taken care of me
Gabby and his girls
Mom and me
Mom and me at Camp Alpine—I was eleven
Queenie and our yellow Pontiac convertible
My sixth-grade school picture
Queenie and my stepdad, Harold Flaxman
Gail and me on her wedding day
Prom night in my Anthony Muto dress
Modeling the jumpsuit from my first fashion show
Senior year of high school
The hanger from my father’s business
An Anne Klein look I could easily wear today
Designing in my first Manhattan apartment
With Louis Dell’Olio in the Anne Klein design room
A publicity still of Louis and me
In my silver fox coat (the same one Anne Klein owned)
Me with a year-old Gabby
With Gabby and Mark on Fire Island
Practicing yoga with a young Gabby in our East 70th St. apartment
With Gabby in the Anne Klein design studio
With Stephen, our good friend Saul Zabar, and our kids
Smoking my Pall Malls
Stephan’s and my wedding day, September 11, 1983
Gabby, Corey, and Lisa
Stephan’s proposal telegram
My old friend Ilene Wetson with Stephan and me
With Uncle Burt Wayne
The Donna Karan presidential campaign, 1992
Bodysuits in the Spring 1985 show
Draping on house model Gina DiBernardo
The first Seven Easy Pieces, featured in Elle magazine
My Donna Karan and DKNY design teams in East Hampton in the early ’90s
DKNY on the move in NYC
In my favorite anorak and jeans from my first DKNY line
The DKNY family (as inspired by my own)
With Jane Chung, my DKNY other half
Taxicab yellow—an essential inspiration
Our iconic neoprene scuba dress
DKNY’s Fall 1994 campaign
A DKNY Men’s suit
Our first DKNY fragrance ad
Announcing DKNY Jeans
Me and Stephan, photographed by Lynn Kohlman
The two of us at work
In his Greenwich Village studio
Hiking at Canyon Ranch in Arizona
Celebrating my fiftieth with Barbra and Jim in Greece
Susie Lish, our family chef and caretaker
Stephan racing his Ducati
Stephan with wife number two
Like mother, like daughter
My long-haired love
Boating buddies
Stephan’s last Christmas in Parrot Cay with our family
The CFDA uniting after 9/11
With Anna Wintour and Carolyne Roehm at the first Seventh on Sale fundraiser
/> With Stefania and Gabby at Super Saturday
Kids for Kids: With Liz Tilberis, Hillary Clinton, and Elizabeth Glaser
My spa and travel buddy, Linda Horn
Stephan and me with Liz Tilberis, Kate Moss, and Johnny Depp at Kids for Kids
Kathleen Boyes, Patti Cohen, and Marni Lewis
With Peter Speliopoulos and stylist Nicoletta Santoro
Bonnie Young and Gabby
With Denise Seegal, Mary Wang, Linda Beauchamp, and Sonja Caproni
Tommy Tong, Julie Stern, Kyoko Nagamori, and Nelly Biden
From bottom left: Xio Grossett, Shelly Bromfield, Bonnie Young, Beth Wohlgelernter, Istvan Francer, Jane Chung, Robert Lee Morris, Julie Stern, Alida Miller, Patti Cohen, and Edward Wilkerson
Urban Zen designers Bessie Afnaim and Oliver Corral
Lynn Kohlman, Colleen Saidman Yee, and Rodney Yee
With Marisa Berenson
…and Christy Turlington Burns
…With Trudie Styler and Sting
Barbra on stage in Donna Karan
…and Ralph Lauren
…With fellow yogi Russell Simmons
With Deepak Chopra and Arianna Huffington
…and Bernadette Peters
With my idol, Giorgio Armani
Watching the Oscars with Oprah and Mary J. Blige
With Natasha Richardson and Gabby
With Susan Sarandon when she presented me with the CFDA Lifetime Achievement Award in 2004
With Angelica Huston
…and Demi Moore
…and Richard Baskin
…With Patti Cohen
…and Leonard Lauder
…and Sandy Gallin
With Michelle Obama and Gabby
…and Calvin Klein
…and Robert Lee Morris
With my creative partners Hans Dorsinville…
…and Trey Laird
Peter Arnell and Patti Cohen
Steve Ruzow, me, Stephan, Tomio Taki, and Frank Mori at our opening on Wall Street
Our celebratory sail around Manhattan after going public
Rodney and Colleen Yee, Gabrielle Roth, and Christina Ong
With His Holiness the Dalai Lama
My Kabbalah teacher, Ruth Rosenberg
Kabbalah leader and dear friend, Karen Berg
Meditating on my rock
In Israel with friends Lisa Fox, Ruth Rosenberg and her husband, Moshe, and their daughters
With Sonja Nuttall in Indonesia
Renewing our vows on Parrot Cay—with Corey, Lisa, and Gabby
A family portrait from Gabby and Gianpaolo’s wedding
Gabby and her bridal party
Me and my “baby”
With Gail and her family, from left: Barbara, Glen, Hank, me, Gail, Dawn, and Darin
With Gail, circa 2000
Lisa, Mackensie, and me after I broke my knee in Sun Valley
In Sun Valley, between broken knees
Our whole clan celebrating Corey’s and Glen’s birthdays in 2013
Corey, Gabby, Lisa, and me on Stephan’s Larger than Life Apple sculpture
Gabby and her father, Mark Karan
Practicing yoga with my grandson Miles
My granddaughter Stefania in Parrot Cay
Celebrating Stephan’s Dressage Horse
My favorite Annie Leibovitz portrait
Stefania and me taking a bow on the DKNY runway
My weekend joy: watching Stefania ride
Like father, like son
Sebastian on his way to Haiti
The Francis Bacon painting I bought for Stephan
A typical yoga class in the city (I wish)
In my East Hampton spa house
The interior of my 819 Madison Avenue store
With architect Dominic Kozerski and a “Breath” chair
In my all-black city closet
My bedroom in Parrot Cay
With Gabby in Parrot Cay
The view from my bedroom
The Urban Warrior campaign, shot in Morocco, fall 2001
Jeremy Irons and Milla Jovovich in Vietnam, spring 2001
A dress with a Bill Morris glass buckle, fall 2004
Demi Moore, fall 1996
A Black Cashmere fragrance ad
Demi Moore in a hand-cut devore dress
Cate Blanchette in my fall 2003 campaign
A close-up of Cate
Stephan’s Donna Karan Signature perfume bottle
Rodney Yee, Colleen Saidman Yee, me, and a patient with Dr. David Feinberg of UCLA
Rodney and Colleen teaching at Urban Zen
The launch of Urban Zen
Cutting the ribbon at Beth Israel with Dr. Woody Merrell
Healer Ruth Pontivanne, who inspired the UZIT program
Urban Zen clothes, spring 2014
Balinese furniture at Urban Zen
An iconic Urban Zen down-filled suede jacket
Haitian objects of desire at Urban Zen
Donna Karan dresses, fall 2000…
…inspired by robes in Bhutan
In India with a matching cow
Making a friend in India
With John James (JJ) Biasucci
With BS Ong and Gabby in Nepal
Arriving in Jacmel, Haiti, to shoot a Donna Karan New York ad campaign
Working with a horn artisan in Haiti
