The ‘Vera Wang’ Gremlin:
To Play It Cool or To Be A Fool?
“Young King”, Acrylic on Canvas, 2023, Karimah Hassan
I met Vera Wang on the front carriage of the Eurostar. She was dripping in style. Black Prada glasses cover her forehead to the bridge of her nose, and a solid black centre part covers her temples. All I could make of the icon were a peak of a nose and plastic voluptuous lips above a black turtle neck jumper. She sat next to a colleague. Both are utterly graceful, utterly delicious and utterly… kind.
The kind of kind that reminds me that the only thing in between my creative icons and myself is time. Not ego.
The conversation sparked when Mrs Wang asked if I and my friend “were travelling to London for fun?” We said we were “returning from a work trip,” but I was quick not to talk too much - enough about me, I want to know more about the mystical duo across from us. Between the mention of Paris fashion week and designer names worn on every limb, I knew this was a creator with a story. However, I didn’t know just whose story yet.
When dinner was served, I asked, rather naively, I now know, “So, are you in the fashion industry?” To which Mrs Wang gracefully, through bated breath, tells me her name. Three syllables roll off the pursed lips, ‘Ve-ra Wang.’ Suspicions confirmed; my friend and I play it cool. We spend the next hour and a half talking about creative direction, motherhood, style, current designers and whether or not we like the Kardashians. (A question she wants answered).
A lesson in not being too shy to ask questions
Vera Wang is an American Fashion designer who launched a label after working at Vogue and Ralph Lauren.
The irony of this situation is that just that morning, I read a paragraph about Vera Wang in my Anna Wintour biography. How wild is it that you can be reading about someone, and then ‘hey presto,’ they show up right in front of your face? Well. Mrs Wang sees the book and tells me how it went down and what the Anna Wintour on my cover is really like. I don’t try to know it all or be clever; I ask questions and listen attentively.
Along the ride, my tongue dances the fine line between wanting to know more and being British and wanting to show respect. Internally I smile; for someone so established and seasoned, she is generous with her time & attention. She doesn’t have to speak to us, nor does she need to know what our generation thinks, and yet, she does.
Despite being 74, I feel like I am talking to a girlfriend just a decade older. Speaking to us reminds her of her inner fire. The train pulls into Kings Cross, London, and we say goodbye. And that’s that. Although apparently, her daughter and I will get along, and I should “find her in the listings if I’m ever in New York”, so who knows… the tale is yet to be continued ;).
Until part II of synchronistic adventures…
Love Karimah Xx
