This article has been updated to include an interview with Vera Wang.
Vera Wang is selling her namesake brand after 35 years in business.
Management group WHP Global has acquired the IP of the brand, the companies announced Monday. As part of the deal, Wang will stay on as founder and chief creative officer of the label, while joining WHP as a shareholder. The group also owns fashion labels including Rag & Bone, G-Star, Isaac Mizrahi, Anne Klein, Bonobos and Joe’s Jeans, kids retailer Toys R Us and, as of June, mall brand Express. Terms of the Vera Wang deal were undisclosed.
“It’s exciting, it really is,” says Wang over the phone. “It was the right combination for me and at the right time. WHP is in full growth mode, and there’s such an energy within what they’re doing and their ambition, passion and dedication, and I really feel very fortunate that they believe so much in me and my brand.”
“Vera Wang is a legend. Her name is synonymous with modernity, artistry and impeccable style. We are honoured to partner with Vera Wang and look forward to building on the brand’s remarkable legacy with new business opportunities around the world,” said Yehuda Shmidman, chairman and CEO of WHP Global, in a statement.
Wang, 75, got her start in fashion with a job at Vogue and also spent time at Ralph Lauren before deciding to launch a bridal line. The Vera Wang brand has been independently owned since its founding in 1990, with Wang as the sole owner and reporting more than $700 million in annual sales, according to the company. What started as a single bridal salon in The Carlyle hotel grew to a fully fledged lifestyle brand. Wang introduced ready-to-wear in 2000, has launched homeware, jewellery, fragrance and shoe categories and partnered with Kohl’s and David’s Bridal on diffusion lines. Her bridal looks are a celebrity favourite: she’s designed wedding dresses for a long list of star clients, including Ariana Grande, Beyoncé, Jennifer Lopez, Mariah Carey, Uma Thurman and Vanessa Hudgens.
WHP Global was formed in 2019, and is a private equity-backed firm created to license and grow consumer brands. With the acquisition of Vera Wang, WHP is creating a premium fashion vertical with the likes of Rag & Bone, Joe’s Jeans and G-Star. The company’s portfolio does over $7 billion in global sales. With the partnership, Wang says her primary focus is to expand geographically, mainly in China, where she has seven stores already, as well as in the Middle East and Latin America — all opportunities she identified but said she couldn’t move on herself. There’s also potential hotels, condos and “experience businesses” she plans to explore to build out her lifestyle portfolio.
On the morning of the deal’s announcement, Wang discusses the decision, why WHP and what advice she has for young designers. (Responses have been edited for clarity.)
Vogue: Congratulations on the deal. Can you explain why now?
With this deal, it’s a combination of 1 plus 1 equals 5, rather than -2. That’s important to stress because as a brand, I haven’t been able to partake in many of the concepts and strategies that I’ve wanted to. With this sale, I will be a shareholder, and it will give me the chance to participate in their company and help govern and steer where we go with my brand — and that’s a special combination. I am not going away. As a privately owned company, that limited how much growth I could fund. Now, I have the right partner at the right stage. I can’t say it’s been easy. But it’s been a very banner year for me, and very important emotionally and in terms of business: it was my 75th birthday, my brand’s 35th anniversary and my 55th year in fashion.
Vogue: I’m sure you’ve had many suitors over the years. Why WHP?
We had many suitors over the years, you’d be amazed if you knew who. With WHP, I studied the arc of where they’re going and how fast they’ve done it. They also really believed in me as a human being, a brand and a partner and that’s very important — the trust in me and what I’ve built. It’s a unique deal in that I was able to participate myself, and that’s a great thing. It makes me feel as though I have a say and that’s not typical. I just know this is the right time, and with what the company has started. WHP has people on the ground in 50 countries — we don’t have that. This is me going, in a way, and joining a company; it’s a new exciting experience for me and hopefully I bring some value to them other than just the brand.
Vogue: How did you manage to stay independent for so long?
I’ll tell you something: I went against my dear father. He’s the reason I have a company. I asked him to pay for design school and he said no — he told me to go get a job. I went to Vogue and I loved it, then I went to Ralph and I loved it. Then, I began to create everything in my bridal store so that it was 100 per cent us. I own a factory in West Palm Beach. I’ve trained sewers. They are the artists, how they translate the clothes and the sketches. All of these things have not been easy, but as hard as it was to found the company, it was harder to maintain. Bit by bit we built synergistic licensees for everything. It’s been a long 35 years. This was brick by brick and bride by bride.
Vogue: What advice do you have for young designers starting out today?
I’m very involved with young designers, I have so much passion for them and other designers. I am, after Polly [Mellen, the long-time Vogue editor who recently passed], probably fashion’s biggest cheerleader. I applaud newness, new thinking, new ideas and that is the future of our industry, our young people. That means a great deal to me. I always say to them: get a job and work for someone before you start your own company. Get paid to learn. Then after that, you can see what opportunities present themselves to you.
I never dreamt I would own a fashion company — at the ripe old age of 40, I could not have done it a day earlier. I’m not of the school that everyone should start with their own company. To work your way up is the most important experience you can have. You have to put in the work, and I’m not talking about Instagram. I’m talking about the gruelling work of sewing a garment.
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