My Journey by Karan Donna

Author:Karan, Donna [Karan, Donna]
Language: eng
Format: azw3, mobi, epub
ISBN: 9781101883495
Publisher: Random House Publishing Group
Published: 2015-10-12T16:00:00+00:00

Credit 15.1

16

NEW YORK STATE OF MIND

My life those days was 99 percent work, 1 percent play. I still tried to run home to make dinner every night, but more often than not, Stephan, Gabby, and I would meet at our favorite Italian restaurant, Sette Mezzo on Lexington Avenue at 70th Street, just a block from our apartment. (That’s assuming Gabby hadn’t already had lunch there with friends. She used to take her whole high school there on our credit card, right after they’d all raided our closets.)

Stephan and I tried not to let anything interfere with our weekends with Gabby, Lisa, and Corey. We were still renting on Fire Island in the summer, and we’d go on ski trips at Christmastime. But otherwise, we were working around the clock.

It was a challenge to keep up with our success while still trying to plan ahead. The year we introduced DKNY, our sales more than doubled, jumping from $40 million to $100 million. A year later, in 1990, the CFDA once again named me womenswear designer of the year. I was thrilled, but I was also scared to death. In my mind, the higher you climbed, the further you had to fall. My answer, as it always had been when I felt out of control, was to work, work, work.

The company culture was shifting. We had more “suits” walking around than ever. One night Beth, my executive assistant for the past six years—the one who observed the Sabbath—came into my office and resigned. We had long since hired someone to supplement her on Fridays and Saturdays, but we still couldn’t keep her. She found an executive position at Hadassah, the Jewish women’s organization. “Beth, you will always have a job here,” I said, hugging her. “I mean it. If you ever get bored at Häagen-Dazs, just call me.” (I’ve always had trouble with names.)

As my co-CEO, Stephan was the brand’s creative visionary. It was his idea to change our name from the Donna Karan Company to Donna Karan International. He never saw us as just a Seventh Avenue label; he saw us as a far-reaching global brand, similar to Chanel, Inc. But we still needed to operate the day-to-day business, and operations were not Stephan’s focus.

Right before launching DKNY, we approached Steve Ruzow to be our chief operating officer. Steve had been running the active-wear division at Warnaco, the American corporation known for underwear, sportswear, and swimwear, including licensees such as Calvin Klein, Chaps, and Speedo. We’d met him when he was at Gottex, where his wife, Miriam, was president of Gottex NY and principal in its parent company. The four of us had become friendly. Stephan and I loved his mixture of warmth and professionalism. We wanted to keep a family atmosphere, however big we grew.

“Steve, the world wants us. They’re lining up every day,” Stephan told Steve the night we set out to recruit him. “But our back end isn’t keeping up with our front. We can’t make the clothes fast enough, and we’re delivering practically in season instead of in advance.

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