Diane von Furstenberg has been a part of the cultural history of fashion since the early Seventies, when she burst upon the New York social scene as part of an “It” couple with her first husband, Egon von Furstenberg.
The wrap dress, which she launched in 1974 and relaunched in 1997, has been her signature, loved and worn by generations of women who have found that it offered them style and security.
“Diane is a woman of power and passion,” said Donna Karan. “Being a woman, understanding the body, Diane brought ease and sensuality to everyday dressing. She created an iconic design that has withstood the test of time. Creatively speaking, there’s no greater accomplishment. The wrap dress will live on forever.”
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“You know, I have a very personal memory of the dress,” said Harold Koda, curator in charge of the Costume Institute at The Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York. “In 1976, I was going to the ballet a lot, and I remember sitting in the [Lincoln Center] plaza waiting, and noticing the number of women who were wearing that wrap dress in a small green print or a small black print. I think it had the kind of impact that the Armani suit had for men in the Eighties.
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“I think it said a lot that she just had a finger on the pulse of contemporary ideas of womanhood,” he added. “It was just a kind of protean item in one’s wardrobe.”
Koda compared the dress to Charles James’ spiraling wrap taxi dress of the Thirties and Claire McCardell’s shirtdress in “very crisp cotton” of the Forties.
“It’s the kind of thing that really is almost beyond fashion, like a chemise, and when I use the word ‘protean,’ I really mean it literally,” he continued. “The way you wrap it, the waistline rises or falls. In the Seventies, it was as vivid a signature as a Pucci print and it became as much a signature as a shape, but it really is the functioning wrap dress itself that I think is adaptable and pleasing to most figures.”
Koda noted that, although European-born, von Furstenberg is “really in the tradition of pure American design.”
Valerie Steele, director of The Museum at FIT, said, “When Diane von Furstenberg appeared on the cover of Newsweek wearing her now-iconic wrap dress, it encapsulated a moment in fashion history. Her slogan ‘Be a Woman, Wear a Dress’ was perfect for an era in which women were achieving equality in the workplace and no longer wanted to look like imitation men. The revival of the wrap dress in recent years indicates that the simplicity and elegance of the style remains relevant to contemporary women.”
The designer herself pointed out that she wasn’t really thinking of anything as abstract as the cultural importance of the dress when she designed it — and she has an extremely clear recollection of just how the signature shape itself was born.
“I just set out to make little dresses that were easy, simple and that could be worn everywhere,” von Furstenberg said. “I had discovered this wonderful jersey fabric that could be printed, and I had started making a T-shirt dress, a shirtdress and a great tent dress, short and long. I then designed a wrap top, similar to the wrap sweaters ballerinas wore. I made it with a matching skirt. It sold really well, and I decided to attach the top to a skirt and turn it into a dress. The wrap dress was born. Because it had a collar and cuffs, it felt tailored, but because it was jersey, it felt to be exactly what women wanted at that time….It was both liberating and empowering, and women embraced it in an overwhelming way….This is what gave it its cultural significance.”
The context of the time of its inception was also important, she added.
“In the Seventies, it was very exciting, because it allowed a woman to go to work and still feel like a woman,” she remembered. “I used to count the dresses walking up and down Park Avenue. All different types of women wore it then, and all different types of women wear it now, because it is about the individual….It is still unbelievably flattering and brings the woman into focus.”
The dress was a star of a remarkable show in Los Angeles, “The Journey of a Dress,” a retrospective of the wrap, which opened at the former May Co. building on Wilshire Boulevard in January.
“It is fascinating to see the history and influence one dress has had on multiple generations of women who embraced it for many reasons, from its shape, to ease of wearing, from the Seventies to today,” said Michael Herz, artistic director at Diane von Furstenberg, who worked closely with his boss on the show.
When asked whether she had a sense, 40 years ago, that her design would have the longevity that it has, von Furstenberg responded, “I had no idea! Even when women everywhere were buying them and they put me on the cover of Newsweek and The Wall Street Journal, I knew that it was a big deal at the time, but did I think I would still be talking about that dress 40 years later? Certainly not.