As one of the few true iconoclasts in fashion, Norma Kamali has always been about doing it on her own-free of trend dictates, system conventions and peer mentality. She also continues to be one of the biggest knock-outs in fashion, as gorgeous as ever in looks and spirit. We connected recently for this Q&A for Preen, a magazine that deserves your attention, if not your subscription…
Kamali has criss crossed high and low culture throughout her 40-year career, from the silk jumpsuits and parachute ballgown skirts to the high-heeled sneakers and convertible jersey dresses she innovated. After getting a degree in illustration from New York’s Fashion Institute of Technology, she skipped off to London at the height of the Mod mania there. Back in New York in 1968, she opened a boutique, stocked with her space-age finds and her own inaugural collection. In 1982, Kamali moved shop and studio into a 10,000-square-foot, white-washed building at 11 West 56th Street. Always in search of the next thing, she skipped the runway for a Super-8 film, and followed that up a few years later in 1984 with a VHS reel of the fall collection that won several awards, including one from the Council of Fashion Designers of America. Kamali was among the first fashion designers to try retailing on the Internet with her fall 1996 collection; that year she also designed costumes for Tharp!, Twyla Tharp’s new dance company.
Today, spreading the gospel of education and wellness share space in her life and in her flagship. This last spring she opened a café on the first floor to give visitors a chance to rest and sample from her Bar XV Wellness collection, a homeopathic line of topical and edible, mostly olive oil-based products, that also sells at luxe hotels and at her online store. The “XV” stands for extra-virgin.
Olive oil from the premium line is donated to the cafeteria at her alma mater, Washington Irving High School, where she also provides clothing for sample sales and created a state-of-the-art design lab as part of her 15-year relationship with the New York City public school system.
Although Kamali hasn’t done a runway show since the early ‘90s and she’s focused her business to a limited international retail network, she’s as busy as ever. There are Japanese licenses for eyewear, handbags and clothes. And she’s been designing lines for Spiegel and Everlast, as well as her own OMO Norma Kamali swimsuits, evening wear, outerwear and can’t-live-without basics.
Even in her zen-like way, Kamali remains a force of spirit. When I finally met her three years ago to write about the latest “rediscovery” of the designer, she looked as youthful as ever but her sage insight was hard-earned as only age can provide. At the time, she told me “being inventive is more fun than just chasing the next season’s trend. It becomes a case of, ‘How many things am I going to do over again? How many fashion shows can you do without wanting to kill yourself?’” She wasn’t just talking about the seasons of clothes, of course, but life.
RA: It’s de rigueur now for fashion designers to also be involved in various other projects, yet you’ve got to be the original multi-hyphenate. What’ve you been up to lately?
Norma Kamali: I have a new opportunity that I can’t go into right now that will allow me…
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