Natasha Clarke
Body

“Timeless beauty” Vera Wang shares the secrets to her success

When iconic fashion designer Vera Wang wowed fans with a post-NEA Awards picture, she received hundreds of comments praising her youthful complexion and “timeless beauty”. 

“Post NEA Award celebration dinner,” Vera captioned the image, which saw her sitting next to fellow designer Keith Lissner at the NEA (National Endowment for the Arts) Awards, her arm draped across his shoulders. “Thank you Keith Lissner and Paul Vinci for hosting!!!!!!” 

“You are amazing,” came the immediate response, one soon echoed throughout the entire comments section. “You never age, what is your secret?”

“Ageing backwards. The both of you,” wrote one fan. 

“Timeless beauty,” declared another, followed by a series of red hearts, with two more added by Vera in response. 

“You are a vampire,” one decided, “you just don't age.”

And while Vera is no stranger to such feedback, the 73-year-old had recently informed Elle magazine that while she’s “very flattered” that people think she’s ageing well, she’d never set out with that as her goal in life.

“I drink vodka, I sleep, I avoid the sun,” she added. “But I like to work. I don’t want to be pigeonholed.”

As she later noted, “I’m confronted with a bit of a moment now where so much has been said about my ageing. I just hope that it doesn’t supersede my work. It brings up the issue of ageism, and I don’t want to be pigeonholed. We pigeonhole women that are pregnant, small, tall, athletic … authenticity means so much to me … I was never really obsessed with ageing.”

She explained that while she can’t speak on behalf of the next generations, “things that exist now did not exist 50 or 60 years ago. There was no such thing as Botox. I’ve always focused on work. Work was my lifeline that kept me feeling relevant and challenged me over the years. I think the mind is more powerful than one could ever understand.”

While work and productivity are held in high regard by the designer, she has also spoken up about the other main factors in her routine - most importantly, sleep. As Vera once told the BBC, "I’ve got to be really honest, one of them is sleep." 

"I value having a vodka cocktail at the end of the day,” she went on to share. “Because it helps me to transition from a very intense work schedule to a bit of a private life."

In the same interview, she reiterated the point that she “never thought about youth” during her years in the fashion industry, putting it down to her daily encounters with “the most beautiful women in the world”. 

"Because of that, I more envision them as my muses,” she explained, before admitting that it was perhaps a means of “dealing with ageing” that could be considered productive, unlike so many others saturating the market. 

Images: Instagram

Tags:
Vera Wang, ageing, ageism, body, designer, beauty