Lady Liberty: The Fabric & Fashion Legacy Of Donna Karan

It was revealed this week that one of the most important designers in the history of American fashion, Donna Karan, is stepping down as chief designer of her namesake brand, Donna Karan International. According to DKI, Karan will remain in close contact with the label she and her late husband Stephan Weiss, founded in the mid-Eighties. Owned by LVMH since 2001, Karan – aged 66, is ready to say goodbye as the matriarch of American fashion. “Everything I do is a matter of heart, body and soul,” says Donna Karan, on her DKNY website. “For me, designing is an expression of who I am as a woman, with all the complications, feelings and emotions.” Let’s take at the key fashion and fabrics Donna Karan, New York's very own lady of design, leaves in her wake.  ‘Seven Easy Pieces' Karan set out from the beginning to dress the woman from head to toe, designing lifestyle pieces au lieu of clothes. “So many women find assembling the right clothes bewildering today,” Karan told the New York Times in 1985, the year her debut collection launched. “They’ve discovered fast ways to put food on the table, but they do not know how to get their wardrobes together easily.” And so the ‘Seven Easy Pieces’ were born. Flexible and mixable, the set of items took the stress out of fashion for the working woman, both day and night, with a jersey bodysuit as its base layer. The other pieces were knits that clung and draped, with varying hemlines and adjustable waists that tied over the jersey bodysuits. Sweaters and coats turned sporty with the dark tights that Karan paired them with. Ultimately Eighties, Karan was the original athleisure designer. The Devore Dress Karan’s devore dress was typically crafted from velvet, with the devore – a burnout effect cause by the dissolution of the cellulose fibers to create a semi-transparent pattern – varying in colour and embellishment. For New York Fashion Week in 2014, coinciding with Donna Karan's 30th anniversary, the dress was a black velvet devore with embroidery detail. One of her latest is the artisan devore skyscraper gown, very sheer in places, with a deep back-V. Black Cashmere Karan has long worked with cashmere, crafting scoop necked coats, knits and lustrous scarves; choosing the goat-derived yarn for its sculptability. Karan revealed in an interview with Imagine Fashion: “I am shaping the body with my hands. I sculpt and mold curves with fabric."And it's always been black: "Black is my canvas and I play with texture, and color with emotion. Proportions change, volumes shift, and I’ll add a stroke of grace here, a strike of power there." Jodhpur Pants   Donna Karan’s FW13 collection featured Jodhpur pants in wool and cotton with leather equestrian patches. Lean trousers are essential fashion item, Karan told department store Saks, in an interview: “I live in skinny pants and love any kind of leather accent.” Karan’s latest SS15 collection carried the Jodhpur again, this time made from vintage-washed satin. Molded Undergarments Karan was the workingwoman’s designer, fusing practicalities with luxury fabrication. DNKY offered bras with molded cups fusing the fabrics for seamless subtlety under thin shirts and for extra comfort and support at work.  Her undergarments were made from microfiber, nylon, elastane and nylon blends, and often carried lace detail for extra sexiness. “The great thing about being a woman designer is you can be selfish and design for yourself,” explained Karan, during a discussion at The New School’s Parsons School of Design last year. “How do I dress the leg? And make the right bra?” Such questions lead her to create Donna Karan Hosiery and Donna Karan Intimates. And despite her departure from DKI, the incredible legacy of Donna Karan - a US design matriarch, can only live on.