Early life and education

Vera Ellen Wang was born and raised in New York City, and is of Chinese descent. Her parents were born in China, and came to the United States in the mid-1940s. Her mother, Florence Wu, worked as a translator for the United Nations, while her father, Cheng Ching Wang, owned a medicine company. Wang has one younger brother, Kenneth.

Wang graduated from The Chapin School in 1967, attended the University of Paris and earned a degree in art history from Sarah Lawrence College. Wang began figure skating at the age of eight. While in high school, she trained with pairs partner James Stuart, and competed at the 1968 U.S. Figure Skating Championships. She was featured in Sports Illustrated's Faces in the Crowd in the January 9, 1968 issue. When she failed to make the US Olympics team, she entered the fashion industry. Wang continues to enjoy skating, saying, "Skating is multidimensional".

Career

Beginning in 1970, Wang was a senior fashion editor for Vogue but left Vogue after being turned down for the editor-in-chief position currently filled by Anna Wintour and joined Ralph Lauren as a design director.

Wang has made wedding gowns for many well-known public figures, such as Chelsea Clinton, Karenna Gore, Ivanka Trump, Campbell Brown, Alicia Keys, Mariah Carey, Victoria Beckham, Avril Lavigne, Jennifer Lopez, Jennifer Garner, Sharon Stone, Sarah Michelle Gellar, Hilary Duff, Uma Thurman, Holly Hunter, Kate Hudson, Khloe Kardashian and Kim Kardashian. Wang's evening wear has also been worn by Michelle Obama.

She has designed costumes for figure skaters, including Nancy Kerrigan, Michelle Kwan and Evan Lysacek. Silver medalist Nancy Kerrigan wore a unique design of Vera's for the 1994 Olympics. She designed the two-piece uniforms currently worn by the Philadelphia Eagles Cheerleaders.

On October 23, 2001, her book, Vera Wang on Weddings, was released. In June 2005, she won the CFDA (Council of Fashion Designers of America) Womenswear Designer of the Year. On May 27, 2006, Wang was awarded the André Leon Talley Lifetime Achievement Award from the Savannah College of Art and Design. Wang was inducted into the U.S. Figure Skating Hall of Fame in 2009, and was honored for her contribution to the sport as a costume designer.

Twenty years after opening her first bridal boutique, Wang was awarded the Leadership in the Arts Award by the Harvard-Radcliffe Asian American Association. She accepted the award on April 17, 2010 at Identities, the Harvard association's annual charity fashion show.

Wang's evening wear has been worn by stars at many red carpet events, including Viola Davis at the 2012 Academy Awards, Sandra Bullock at the Oscars in 2011 and Sofia Vergara at the 65th Emmy Awards.

She was honored with the Geoffrey Beene Lifetime Achievement Award in 2013.

Retail

In 1990, she opened her own design salon in the Carlyle Hotel in New York that features her trademark bridal gowns. She has since opened bridal boutiques in New York, London, Tokyo and Sydney. Wang has also expanded her brand name through her fragrance, jewellery, eyewear, shoe and homeware collections.

'White by Vera Wang' launched on February 11, 2011 at David's Bridal. Prices of the bridal gowns range from $600-$1,400 which gives more brides a more affordable way to wear Vera's designs. In 2002, Wang began to enter the home fashion industry and launched The Vera Wang China and Crystal Collection, followed by the 2007 release of her diffusion line called Simply Vera, which are sold exclusively by Kohl's. In Spring of 2012, Wang teamed up with Men's Wearhouse to offer two tuxedo styles available in both the retail and rental areas of their inventory. In June 2012, she expanded in Australia with the opening of "Vera Wang Bride Sydney" and her first Asian flagship store 'Vera Wang Bridal Korea', helmed by President Jung Mi-ri, in upmarket neighbourhood Cheongdam-dong in Gangnam-gu, Seoul.

Personal life

In 1989, she married Arthur Becker in an interfaith Baptist and Jewish ceremony. They resided in Manhattan with their two adopted daughters: Cecilia (born 1990), who currently resides in New York City, and Josephine (born 1993), who attended The Chapin School and currently attends Harvard University. Becker was the CEO of an information technology services company called NaviSite until August 2010. In July 2012, Vera Wang Co. announced that the couple have separated. The separation was amicable.

In popular culture

Several movies and television shows have mentioned Wang's works.

In the Sex and the City TV series, Charlotte York found Wang's wedding dress to be the perfect wedding dress, and wore it for her wedding to Trey MacDougal. Wang's design was mentioned in the NBC television show The West Wing in the episode "The Black Vera Wang". In ABC's Ugly Betty TV series, Vera Wang makes a cameo as herself, designing a dress for Wilhelmina Slater's wedding to Bradford Meade.

In the film Sex and the City, Vera Wang was among the bridal gowns Carrie Bradshaw wore in her Vogue photo shoot. In the film Bride Wars, Anne Hathaway and Kate Hudson wore custom-made Vera Wang gowns.

In one of Totally Spies! episodes, "The Wedding Crasher", a villain named Wera Van (parody of Vera Wang), desires revenge on those who rejected her wedding dress designs.

Vera Wang also designed a wedding dress for Sarah Michelle Gellar's character Buffy Summers in the TV Series Buffy The Vampire Slayer episode "The Prom".

In the series, "How to Get Away with Murder", the character Michaela Pratt mentioned a custom Vera Wang wedding gown when confronting her fiancé, Aiden Walker, about his sexuality.

In the TV Series, "Gossip Girl," Vera Wang is mentioned in multiple episodes and is one of Blair Warldorf's favourite designers. Blair has a wedding dress designed for her wedding to Prince Louis of Monaco by Vera Wang. Blair decides she can no longer wear it after losing her and Louis' baby in a car accident, and has another designed instead. The three bridesmaids in Blair's wedding wear Vera Wang bridemaids short dress.

Also in Revenge (TV series), Victoria Grayson played by Madeleine Stowe wears a steel gray Vera Wang mermaid gown in her second wedding with Conrad Grayson (Henry Czerny). The dress was actually shown in black at Wang's Fall 2012 show.

Filmography

Movies

• First Daughter (2004) as herself
• The September Issue (2009) as herself

Television

• Gossip Girl (2012) as herself
• Keeping Up with the Kardashians (2011) as herself
• Ugly Betty (2007) as herself
• Chelsea Lately (2011) as herself

Books

• Vera Wang, Vera Wang on Weddings, HarperCollins, October 2001 (ISBN 9780688162566).

[ Source: Wikipedia ]