fashion trends winter 2017

fashion trends winter 2017

   18.11       Fashion 2017

---

mary grove: hello, goodafternoon, how is everybody? excited? thank you so muchfor joining us. my name is mary grove,and i'm the director of google for entrepreneurs,and it is my tremendous honor to welcome diane vonfurstenberg back to google. our guest today isa remarkable talent who needs nointroduction, but i would like to share threethings that i particularly

admire about diane. the first is that she isthe ultimate entrepreneur, an incredible self starterwhose story really embodies the quintessentialamerican dream. from diane's arrival innew york city in 1970 with just one suitcasefull of dresses, dvf products are now sold in55 countries around the world, and has evolved far beyond theiconic wrap dress which we're celebrating the 40thanniversary of this year.

number two, is diane'ssteadfast commitment to empowering womenall over the world. in 2011 she established, throughthe diller von furstenberg family foundation,the dvf awards. and these awards recognize womenwho show tremendous courage and bravery in theface of adversity. i admire everything shedoes to support women. and thirdly, i admire hergenerosity and openness and sharing sopersonally her own story,

her own amazing family history,her journey in establishing and building a global brandthat is loved around the world, her personal battle with cancerwhich she fought courageously and successfully, and herviews on love and life. please join me in welcomingdiane von furstenberg. diane von furstenberg: hi. mary grove: welcome, it'swonderful to have you back. diane von furstenberg:thank you. when i came hereto speak in 2005,

i think, they werepractically no women here. and i'm not sure theothers knew who i was. and that's definitely changed. and but it was prettyamazing already, but it was nothingcompared to what it is now. so it's fun to be here. mary grove: welcome back. before we get started, i wantto cue just a quick video, which is the journey ofthe wrap dress.

[video playback] [music playing] [end video playback] so diane, i wantedto get started by talking about your roots,and you shared so much of your personal journey--you open your book by talking about your mother's courageousstory as a holocaust survivor, how she gave birth toyou against all odds. and she said to you, youare my torch of freedom,

and taught you thatfear is not an option. can you share with us a memoryof how your mother helped you become the womanyou wanted to be. diane von furstenberg:well, first of all, i think my mother was, whatthey call today, a tiger mom. which is that, if iwas afraid of the dark she would lock me into thecloset, which today you could probably be arrested for. but of course, after 10minutes, it wasn't dark anymore,

because when you're in the darkfor 10 minutes you can see. and also you realize thatthere's no reason to be afraid. so my mother didn'twant me to be afraid. and one of the reasons why shedidn't want me to be afraid is because of her own history. at the age of 22, shewas a prisoner of war and she went to thenazi concentration camp of auschwitz andravensbruck and a third one. she came back, sheweighed 49 pounds,

i mean, less than her bones. she wasn't supposed tohave survived but she did. she went back home andher mother fed her. six months later her fianceecame back to belgium-- he had been in switzerland--and they got married, and the doctor said youabsolutely cannot have a child. because if you havea child-- your body can't handle it, andbesides the child will probably be not normal.

well, sure enough, i wasborn nine months later, and i was not normal. and you know when--well, you are all young so you know that whenyour mother is very strong you protect yourselffrom all that strength. but then when yourmother passes away, you think a little bit more ofthe impact that she had on me. and so i wantedto tell her story. and by telling-- by doingresearch and telling her story,

i realize that iam her vengeance. and i am the way i am because ofthat, because of what she was. so i ended up writingabout my mother and then ended upwriting about me. and so this book, this memoirhas been really difficult. i've never gone to a therapybefore, and i did that. but i really opened myself,and i tell it really as it is because i think thattruth and honesty is certainly the most useful thing youcould do for yourself,

but it's also good to doit, to have others do it. so i am glad that people areresponding well to the book, because otherwise iwould feel terrible. i would feel horrible thati open myself for nothing. so i hope you enjoy. mary grove: thank you fordoing that, absolutely. so in the business offashion the wrap dress which launched in 1974, by1978 had sold millions already throughout the nation and it wasrevolutionary in its softness,

its versatility. what do you think the wrapdress symbolized then, and what does it symbolizenow, 40 years later. diane von furstenberg: well,the first thing it symbolized is that i could pay my bills. which was, at theend, my first goal was to be independent becausemy mother put it in my head, and i really wantedto be independent. so i became independentthrough that dress.

but because it was fashion,what now i realize-- of course i didn't realize it then,but now looking back-- i realize that as i was becomingindependent and confident and the woman i wantedto be, i was sharing it to other women in fitting rooms. so i was getting confidentand i was selling confidence through the dress. so that dress, to me,i just made that dress. it's not like i thoughtit was something

that will live for that long. but i guess that inthe sense that it was my need, my ownpersonal need for freedom. the dress was good quality, itwas effortless, it was sexy, it was not too expensive,but it just molded you. it was proper enoughand sexy enough. somehow i guess that messagethat was done through a dress really took on, and womenreally reacted to it. and everyone in americawore that dress.

i mean, i was 25 andwithin no time at all we were making 25,000dresses a week, which is 50,000sleeves, that's a lot. i remember i used to say thatbecause it looked like more. so i lived anamerican dream, which of course, my american dream isnothing compared to a google. i mean, it was very minute. but it was, nevertheless,an american dream and i was a young woman.

mary grove: so speaking ofgoogle, and welcome back to silicon valley, you'vealways been so transformative and disrupting the fashionindustry if you look back across the last four decades. you started selling your dresseson qvc and the home shopping network before merchandiseclothing was really sold on television. last year you worked with sergeyto debut google glass in a dvf fashion show, as well as launchthe first shoppable hangout

where consumers could purchaseproducts live through a google+ hangout. so looking now,what technologies are you most excitedabout or do you think are most critical to thesuccess of your business? diane von furstenberg: wellfirst of all, i joke always and i say that i'm sohappy that i am old enough to have danced at studio54, and young enough to be part of thedigital revolution.

mary grove: i saw youinstagram outside. before we came in. diane von furstenberg: i do. and so i love technology. and i think it's soincredible what has happened, and all the groundsthat we've broken, and all the things that youcan do that there was no way that we could dreamthat we could do. so i am very, veryinto it and i love it.

and again, it was an accidentthat i presented the google glass first in the world. i mean, it was-- butit just shows you that when you areyoung-- or not young-- it's important to push thedoors whatever is happening. and it's justbecause i saw sergey hiding behind a treetrying these things. and i said, what are you doing? and he said, come, i show you.

and they hadn't shown anyone. this was in sandvalley and he showed me that and we started to talk. and it was july and isaid, sergey have you ever been to a fashion show? he said, no never. i said, you should cometo my show in september. that was it. and then two or three weekslater, i get a call from sergey

and he said, you know,i was thinking how about showing googleglass on the runway. and i thought, oh. i didn't even understandwhat he was talking about. i said sure. and what it was,it must have been that day with talkingmarketing, and saying, how can we show it to the world in theway that is not just dry tech. and somebody saidthe word fashion,

and he said, oh fashion. i have a friend in fashion. she invited me toa fashion show. and that is actually howthe whole thing happened. and when you read thebook, it's at the very end of the whole story it's atthe very end of the book. you'll see that that day iwasn't particularly loving my show, and so anyway,google glass kind of saved my show because-- anyway,so it's a long story,

but it just showsyou that you always have to be very wide open andcurious and open to anything. mary grove: so on that note,in following your journey, i notice that you have a uniquefor recognizing an opportunity and then seizing the moment. so one example wouldbe in your book you talk to how youhad trained in italy, and you noticed this trend ineurope where t-shirts, fashion t-shirts were just becomingfashionable in the jersey

material, the soft material. and so you broughtthat to america and then evolved itto the wrap dress. another example would berelaunching your business when you noticed thatthe hip young girls were wearing vintage dvfdresses from the 70s and relaunching the wrap dress. i'm curious if you see anybig new opportunities today, if you think fashion startupscan really do anything

to seize a gap. diane von furstenberg:oh, my god. you don't need any-- you don'tneed me to tell you that. i mean, there's so manyintelligent people here were looking for opportunitiesand pushing the ground. i mean, if anything, i'mhere to learn from you. but it is, i think itis important to dare and push and look and becurious and also when you fail, you fail.

then you get backup and do it again. it's-- life is a journey. it's a big journey. and people come in, peoplego out, you have successes, you have failures, and as longas you're true to yourself, it's ok. mary grove: so i wantto talk about the brand, the global brand thathas become a phenomenon. and you arrived in new yorkand launched with the dress,

but ended uptransforming and growing the line into cosmetics, intofragrances, a home line, and so much more. can you talk about thelessons you learned along the way about developingdvf as a brand? diane von furstenberg: oh, mygod, i learned so many lessons. but i am not necessarily agood example of business. i am an entrepreneur. i am a dreamer.

and i'm a person who canmake-- who can have an idea and make it happen. i'm not the best executive. i'm not a ceo. so the lesson thati would say is that it's important to recognizeyour strengths and weaknesses. but i mean in the book--this book is like therapy. i never went to therapy before,and this book was therapy. but it shows that it doesn'tmatter how old you are.

i mean, i'm a grandmother. i'm old, i have-- i came up withsomething that's already 40, that you think that's so old. and yet i still think ofmyself like i'm a young girl and i'm starting up. and i guess i'llalways be like that. but i think in a sense that'salso my energy and who i am. that's why i startagain and again. mary grove: love is lifeis love, i heard you say.

so in the book you talkabout how you often speak with young people anda favorite piece of advice you give them is it's passionand persistence that matter, and dreams areachievable, but there are no shortcuts,and no hard work. what is the best-- i want toflip that question and ask you. what is the bestpiece of career advice you received along theway, and how did that impact your journey?

diane von furstenberg:i don't know. i mean, the only real advicethat i got from my mother which i remember the mostis never be a victim, and never blameanyone for anything even if they are blameable. just deal with it. and that was great advicebecause resentment is toxic and blaming peopledoesn't help anything. i mean, the independence--what my mother gave

me was the independence andthat is really something that i value so much. now what i found out by myself,and really, really early on, and i am astounded thati realized that early on, and that would bemy advice to anyone, is that the most importantrelationship in life is the one youhave with yourself. i don't think i can givebigger advice, advice that applies to everyone,men, women, old, young,

it doesn't matter. because at the end, thestrength is in yourself and it's not in somebodyelse, and it's not any guy that's goingto make-- it's not. it's you. then if you havethat relationship with yourself figuredout, and it's not like it you figure it out andit's good forever. it's practice.

it's every day. you have to beangry with yourself, and then you have tobe nice to yourself, and a lot of different things. it's like pruning a tree,or cleaning the plumbing. but once you do havethat, and once you really have a relationshipwith yourself, then any other relationshipis a plus and not a must, and so you're not needy.

and i think that it's important. so that's my advice. remember. mary grove: most importantrelationship is with yourself. diane von furstenberg:that's right. mary grove: soshifting gears a bit, i want to talk aboutthe future and what you're focused onin the road ahead. can you tell us a littlebit about your new tv show?

diane von furstenberg: oh. yeah, so this yearwas very, very busy. in january i celebratedthe 40th anniversary of the wrap dress in abig exhibition at lacma in the los angeles, which isnow featured in this big coffee table book, rizzoli,"the journey of a dress". then i finished my memoir, whichwas very painful and very, very tiring. and then i also did something alittle crazy, i did a tv show.

and it's called the houseof dvf and in a sense it's both to be intouch with young people and also because i see whatgarbage that my granddaughters watch on television. and so how can i go to thatgenre and apply to that, and make it fun, and makeit naughty, and make it informative, butat the same time manage to pass some strong,empowering messages. so we came up withthis idea of six

to eight girls whocome into the company and they learn everything frommerchandising to retailing to marketing and design,and then one of them will win and becomea brand ambassador. so we already havethree episodes which you couldprobably see online. it's on e. and sundaynight at 10 o'clock you can watch episode four. and it's eightepisodes and it will

end on december 20th i think. mary grove: great. diane von furstenberg:and one of the candidates is from the bay area, but i'mnot going to tell you who wins. mary grove: so interms of looking ahead from a business perspective,in your book you talk about dvf products aresold in over 55 countries, one of the more recentcountries you entered was china. can you talk about your entryinto the chinese market,

how you-- diane von furstenberg: ok,first, first of all i love china. i mean i grew up readingbooks about china, pearl buck, or tenten. i was always fascinated bythe mystery and the strength in the wall ofchina, everything. so the first time i wentto china was 1989 or 1990, and there were only bicyclesin beijing at the time.

so i wanted to be known-- iwoke up about maybe by now it's maybe four yearsago, and i said, i want to be known in china. and so i went to china a lot. and i became very friendlywith a lot of people, artists and writers, and bloggers. and i spent a lot of timebecause i wanted to-- because when i was a younggirl, even though it's funny because even though ididn't think i was going

to be in fashion, iremember that i used to say, if you sell one t-shirt toevery chinese, you make-- and so i alreadyhad that in my mind. so i really wantedto come to china and not sound like anamerican colonizer. and so i spent timeknowing the people and becoming friends with them. and little by little i gotknown in china and i have-- mary grove: how many stores now?

diane von furstenberg:oh i don't know. i have-- i have about40 stores i think. quite a lot in china. and i have how many? one million or twomillion followers? i mean a lot. so i like chinese people. i think they are smartand they they're great. i totally identify and iwish i spoke the language,

but then again, i'mnot mark zuckerberg. mary grove: so interms of community, you've been incrediblyinvolved through philanthropy, through your ownfamily foundation. more recently supportedefforts like the high line in the west side of manhattannear the google office and a new park and artspace that's called pier 55. what is your hopefor where new york city might be in 5 to 10 years?

diane von furstenberg:well, let's hope that it stays out ofthe water for one thing. and you know, i alwayssaw new york like venice. for me it's like venice. it's the center ofboth commerce and art. every artist in the worldwants to show in new york and be sold in new york. so for me venice and newyork were very similar. so that's why i'm veryinvolved into the waterways.

and i think thatwe had a tendency of going inland and buildinghighways along the coast. so now we're tryingto the change that. when i first came to newyork it was very, very cheap. but it was alsovery, very dangerous. probably goes together. but at the sametime, they were a lot of-- because it was very cheap,there were a lot of artists there and it was fun.

it was really, really fun. now it's different. it's much more expensive,and it is different. but it still hasa lot of energy. and i think that one of thereasons that new york has so much energy is becauseit's built on granite. so the minute you get to newyork, you have a lot of energy. and i'm sure google isbuilt on granite too. whereas paris isbuilt on sand, so you

have a tendency tokind of fall asleep. mary grove: do you spendmuch time back in europe now? or are you betweeneurope and here? diane von furstenberg:i am european, so i have a place in paris. and so it's important forme to be-- it's nice for me to go to europe. but my children andmy grandchildren now live on the west coast, soi have a tendency to go west.

mary grove: are there anyup and coming designers you think we shouldbe on the lookout for? diane von furstenberg:well, i am the president of the councilof fashion designers of america so i am basically themother of all designers so as the mother of all designers,i can't have a favorite child. mary grove: youhear it here first. so on that note, i am curious. we talked a lot about howyour story personifies

the american dream,you're an entrepreneur with this tremendousglobal perspective, and the way that businessesare born and grow has changed tremendouslyin the last 40 years. even in fashion, you'veseen the consolidation of the large departmentstores, for example. do you think that it wouldbe easier or more difficult now to build a globalbusiness and brand? diane von furstenberg: i don'tthink it's harder, actually.

i think maybe it's easier. because you have the internet,so everyone has a voice. if you have the internet, youjust do a website at the start. so then you have a voice. so i think that theinternet has given everyone more democrat-- democracy? democracy. even though sometimesit's a little dangerous. so i think that overall, andthe world is more global,

and also you have morementoring systems. and as the cfda, we have anincredible program with vogue. it's called the cfdavogue fashion fund. and we mentor youngdesigners and help them and that has reallyhelped enormously. so i think that peopleare more into mentoring. but of course,everything goes fast. mary grove: in afew moments, i'm going to switch gears and takequestions from the audience.

so if you have aquestion in mind, please feel free togo ahead and line up. so diane, i want totalk about your legacy. and you've talked aboutthe various phases of your life, howit was independence, getting independence, how itwas growing your business, now it's sort of whatlegacy do you leave behind. you said that whenyou and joel horowitz were working on transformingthe company in 2012,

you did an exercisewhere everybody defined three words thatexemplified the brand. those were effortless,sexy, and on the go. so if you coulduse three words now to describe the legacy youhoped dvf will leave behind, what might they be? diane von furstenberg:well, i think that my mission in lifeoverall, business or not, is really to empower women.

since i empowered myselffirst, and after i've empowered myself,it's important that i feel that everyone can bethe woman they want to be. and so i do thatthrough my work, by making them feel sexy andattractive with the clothes, but also through mentoringand philanthropy. so maybe i hope to beremembered as a woman who did it for herselfand for others. mary grove: let's take somequestions from the audience.

if you could introduce yourselfto start, that'd be great. audience: hi, diane. my name's connor i mightbe behind the camera-- diane von furstenberg:the only man here? mary grove: my husbandis also here in the back. diane von furstenberg:all right. who's is your husband? mary grove: steve grove. audience: the bearded one.

audience: well, thank you somuch for coming out and talking to us. it's been wonderfulto hear from you. my question is onyour advice that you give about having yourrelationship with yourself is so importantand that you we're astounded you foundthat out so early. how did you find thatout, and what do people do on a day to day basis tohelp build that relationship?

diane von furstenberg:how did i find out? i don't know. i was fascinated by mirrors wheni was a tiny, tiny little girl. none that i liked what isaw in the mirror, because i didn't, but i liked that ihad control over that thing. you if i did that,she would do that. you did that, they'd do that. so i think that itstarts from there. my relationship, it startedwith the mirror, i have to say.

but it's wasn'tnarcissism, because i didn't like what ilook like at all. but i like that i had control. and so it made me realize thati have control over myself. audience: that's awesome. i've always tried to explain mylove of mirrors to other people too. so i can just pointthem right to that clip. that's perfect.

thank you. diane von furstenberg:that's very brave of you. be brave, that's right. audience: i have a questionfrom when you first emerged in the fashion scene. what has been thebiggest surprise to you in terms of what you'veseen in the fashion world? diane von furstenberg: whatis the biggest surprise that i've seen inthe fashion world.

oh my god, i don't know. i guess that there arenot that many things that actually surprise me. audience: it can bea specific trend. diane von furstenberg: what? diane von furstenberg:oh, the big trend. but the big trends, they don'tappear like all of a sudden it's a big trend. it kind of crawls on you.

and if you are a designerwhich at the end is what i am, you kind of smellit before it comes. and that can't be explained. that's really just themystery of fashion. audience: so you can't besurprised, you know everything? diane von furstenberg: no, idon't know everything at all. and the you know, the moreyou know you know nothing. no, no, no. but i think it's-- maybe whati would say what surprised me

the most is that fashion atthe end is a huge industry, huge industry. but it's also a very mysterious,very mysterious thing. that expands not juston clothes, but food, and the way people do things. a little bit of acollective madness. audience: thank you. audience: hi, diane,my name is maida felix. you've talked about success,and how you sometimes failed

and sometimes succeeded. so i was wondering if you canrecall a time where you failed? diane von furstenberg:oh, i failed many times. you've got to read the book. audience: yeah. [laughter] diane von furstenberg:i failed many times, but what i will sayto you is that i never dwelled on my failures.

i just said, ok move on. this is the reality,whatever, cut your losses, and then move on. and then as you moveon, things happen good. and then you don't evenrealize that it all started with a failure. so that also was alesson from my mother. she said not to dwellon the darkness. always look for thelittle bit of light,

and build around the light. audience: and doyou think-- where do you find that strength? because i feel as youngpeople, sometimes it's easy to get comfortableif you have a job. how can we find that strengthto jump and not be afraid? diane von furstenberg:the truth is that it's not the strengththat you need in order to jump. you got to want it.

and wanting it most oftenstarts from frustration. i don't know-- i don't thinki know any successful person whose success didn't startfirst with a huge frustration. diane von furstenberg:that is the truth. audience: diane,my name's emily. i have a question for you. so at google-- diane von furstenberg:you have a pretty dress. audience: oh, thank you.

it's designed by you. so we don't have a lotof women at google, but i imagine in theprofessional world, it's full of womenand there's lots of cattiness and mean people. how do you handlereally catty people? like, in your show? diane von furstenberg:we aren't catty, are we? no, it's-- how doyou, i don't know--

i wouldn't wasteany time on that. i really wouldn't. at the end, you know it's justwhat matters is what matters. audience: i reallyenjoy your show. and i love the message you give. diane von furstenberg: ohyou mean about the show. diane von furstenberg: well,that, you have to understand, that the producerspushed them to. that's the show.

the show they kind of say,oh come on, are you upset, they-- and i getso mad when they do that because i don'twant that to be there. so it's to createa little drama. and i remember mygranddaughter telling me, didi, you need drama,you need drama. mary grove: but you havezero tolerance for-- diane von furstenberg: no,i don't no, i don't like it. audience: hello,my name is firese.

i was wondering inyour career, how much were you driven bythe business side and how much were youdriven by the artistic side? diane von furstenberg: my firstdrive was to be independent. so it was really to besuccessful financially, to buy my finance independence. and so i didn't evenrealize at the time how much the creativeside mattered. i mean, i just usedthe creative side

in order to achievethe next thing. i would like to be able to spendmore time now on the creative because i realize thati'm much better at that. but unfortunately,you need both. but i personallyprefer the creative. the creative is notjust designing a dress. it's thinking howyou could sell it, it's also marketing, it's alot of that, and that i love. audience: hi, diane, i'm lily.

so in the lastfew years, there's been so much of a focuson, can women have it all, the feminine and entrepreneursand family life and business life, and you make it seem easy. diane von furstenberg: it's not. audience: and i'm justwondering what advice you have for people tryingto strike that balance and go forward. diane von furstenberg:it's not easy.

i mean it's not easyto-- people always say how did you have a careerand children and a husband, and most probably thehusband is the hardest. and it's so unfair that isay that, because in my case, it's not true. i have a husband whois absolutely not hard. but to combine it allis very, very difficult. but the truth is i thinkthat women are equipped-- i think women, we multitaskbefore there was such a word.

because we are usedto handling it all and do it all and everything. since we're mostlywomen, i always say, we have our period every month,and nobody knows about it, right? men couldn't handle that. so i think that we'rejust used to-- it's hard. it's hard to do it all,it's hard to have it all. but it's worth it.

because i think a womanshould have children, whether she has them oradopts them or whatever, and i also thinkthe woman should have an identityoutside the home. so there you go. good luck. my name is emily and thankyou again for taking time to come here and to meetall of the lovely ladies and gentleman here at google.

i want to share withyou a little bit about myself,because they do want to ask you for your advice. i grew up being veryinvolved in art and design, and i thought thatthat was something that i reallywanted to get into. when i graduatedcollege, we were just recovering from theeconomic recession so at that point intime my peers and i,

we were just happy to get a job. we weren't thinkingabout our passion, we just wanted to makesure we weren't unemployed. so i got into tech, and ifound my way here at google. and when google comescalling, you don't say, oh well, i don't know, idon't want to be in tech, you just say hey where is thedotted line, i'm going to sign. but now i definitely wantto ask for your advice and see if i still have apassion for art and fashion,

what should i do? should this besomething i can pursue? diane von furstenberg: ithink that first of all you have to make surethat you have to have an idea that make sense. and maybe you can combine yourpassion for art with tech. and that's really how it goes. you have to dosomething that you like. clearly.

but i don't know, maybeyou're just a painter, and you'd like to paint, andyou could also be a tech. i think that you have to listento heart but also to your brain and make sure that whateveryou do makes sense. audience: hi, so i'm a littlebit older most of the crowd here. so when i'm listening to youtalk about all the failures you've had in yourlife, and for me, especially since i'm kindof stuck in the start

over phase, throughno doing of my own. how do you go about the startover after the failures? do you have a ritual? because i mean, it'sgoing to happen a lot. that's part of being alive. so what's your process fordealing with it after you figured out you failed and youneed to go onto the next step? diane von furstenberg:don't dwell on the negative. just don't dwell on thenegative and learn from it.

and just be excitedabout starting again. i mean just starting,there's nothing more fun than starting becauseso much is unknown. and the unknown is exciting,it shouldn't be scary. i think it's exciting,and you just go for it. i mean, this is a companywhere if you don't believe in miracles here,then i don't know. mary grove: one followup question, diane, related to that.

in your book you talk aboutyou had this incredible success starting so earlyin your twenties, and then you took a briefhiatus and then decided to relaunch and come back. so what was thethought process where you decided to start again? diane von furstenberg:well, i thought i was finished with fashionand then i came back, and i realized mybrand had disappeared.

with that, also a sideof my identity and i didn't like that. i mean, i've hadfailures, but i mean, when i hear it likethat, it's like overall, my life has beenpretty successful. so what i tried toexplain in the book is that noteverything goes right. and you just make it work. but there were a lot of momentsthat-- i mean, nobody outside i

was interviewedrecently in london by a journalist, a fashionjournalist, who has known me all along allthrough these things, and he had no idea that i wasgoing through a difficult time. because you don't say it. and he read thebook, and he said, oh my god i had noidea, this and that. so what i triedto do in the book is that it's like anx-ray of how i felt.

and how i felt is how i felt,so outside nobody knew that. mary grove: we're gladyou launched again. last question. audience: hi, i'm erin. i just had a quick question. there's a lot of interestingstuff going on in fashion tech, particularly arounddemocratizing luxury brands. i think you yourself are onwebsites like rent the runway, i don't know ifthat's by choice.

i'm just curious tosee as a designer if you think that those sorts ofmechanisms devalue your brand, or you're happy that morepeople are wearing them? diane von furstenberg:i met those girls. i think i was the firstperson that they came to see and they were smart. i almost hired them. and again, i said about them--i don't know if anyone knows, but it's about rentingclothes-- and i

think that they're greatgirls, but i'm not sure that five years from nowthat what they're doing now is exactly what theywill be doing then. at this point they have thelargest dry cleaning business in the country. so it's-- but itwas their way in. and so we'll seewhere it all goes, i think we all welcome that. i think we all welcomethat, i think it's all good.

mary grove: thank you. diane von furstenberg:even fighting fakes, you know that'spart of the journey. mary grove: sobefore we wrap up, i'd like to closewith something that i like to call freeword association. where i say oneword, and i'm going to ask you to say the firstword that comes to mind. starting with fashion.

diane von furstenberg: fashion,fashion i would say beauty. beauty, mary grove: travel. diane von furstenberg:travel i would say adventure. mary grove: belgium. diane von furstenberg:belgium, i would say boring. mary grove: confidence. diane von furstenberg:confidence i would say confidenceis indispensable.

mary grove: google diane von furstenberg:google is google is what it soundslike it googles. mary grove: passion. diane von furstenberg: huh? diane von furstenberg:passion, passion, life. mary grove: role model. diane von furstenberg:role model, my mother. mary grove: andfinally, wrap dress.

diane von furstenberg:wrap dress paid my bills. [laughter and applause] oh that, that's a littlepiece of the tv show. mary grove: beforewe close, we want to give everyone a sneak previewof this sunday's episode. -amanda come on in. how are you? -good, how are you? i'm literally freaking out, likeshaking, my heart's beating,

i think my vision islike going blurry. -bronson came to see meand he say, wow you know, i'm a little nervous. how's it going? -at times, there's likea little bit of tension. -what goes on? -well i got in a littleargument with britney today. she's trying to say littlethings to put herself here and put the others below,and i don't think that's right.

she likes to be the boss andtake charge of the situation. and i've kind ofjust let her, but i'm at the point where i--i'm getting emotional. i don't usually-- -no, that's ok. -thank you. -you know, when iwas young i didn't want to be taken advantage of. as i get more confidentand less insecure,

i realize that you haveto stand for who you are. -yeah. -it's important, especiallyin the fashion industry, to actually forget about thepersonality of the people you're working with. just get the job done. [applause] diane von furstenberg:sunday at 10 o'clock. and you can tweet a lotso my ratings go up.

mary grove: beforewe close, i wanted to share with everyone thereare copies of diane's two new books. one is the memoir, "thewoman i wanted to be." i can't recommendit highly enough. i loved reading every word. and the second is thisbeautiful coffee table book, called "the journey of a dress." and diane will be with usa bit longer to sign them.

diane von furstenberg: if youhave the book on your laps, can you bring it up like thatso i could take a nice picture? all right. mary grove: give avery warm thank you.