Ralph Lauren brought a star-studded crowd to its feet Friday night, as he made his grand entrance amid scores of models on the steps of Central Park’s Bethesda Terrace.
It was a triumphant evening for Lauren, who celebrated his company’s 50th anniversary with a runway show featuring more than 150 models of all ages, including Kaia Gerber and Gigi Hadid. The lavish event, which experts estimate cost upwards of $3 million, was New York Fashion Week’s hottest ticket and a dazzling commemoration of Lauren’s talent and ambition.
“You’ve defined American fashion and style, and you’ve made a lot of us dream really big,” said actress Anne Hathaway, who was seated alongside Jessica Chastain.
The collection pulled from some of Lauren’s Americana-flavored greatest hits — Navajo-inspired prints, sumptuous brocades and velvet and Western-style accessories, among them.
The 78-year-old arbiter of elegance shook hands and hugged well-wishers, including Oprah Winfrey, Pierce Brosnan and Robert De Niro, while Kanye West, Blake Lively and Steven Spielberg looked on. Others whipped out their cell phones to capture the visibly moved Lauren as he worked his way through the applauding crowd.
Afterwards, guests sat down for a black-tie dinner around Bethesda Fountain, where they feasted on filet mignon from his Double RL Ranch in Colorado.
“What is real is what lasts and we are here because you have lasted,” Winfrey said in a toast.
Not bad for a boy from The Bronx who never went to design school.
Born Ralph Lifshitz to Ashkenazi Jewish immigrants from Belarus, he grew up in the Mosholu Parkway area with his three siblings. As a teenager he became interested in clothes, scouring secondhand shops for army pants, bomber jackets and military coats. When he was 16, he and his brother changed their last name to Lauren.
“My given name has the word s - - t in it. When I was a kid, the other kids would make a lot of fun of me. It was a tough name. That’s why I decided to change it,” Lauren told Winfrey in 2002. “Then people said, ‘Did you change your name because you don’t want to be Jewish?’ I said, ‘Absolutely not. That’s not what it’s about.’ ”
A keen observer of social sets, Lauren instinctively practiced aspirational lifestyle marketing before the term even existed. The name Ralph Lauren would eventually become synonymous with WASP culture and the Ivy League upper crust.
“There were also people who thought that because I was Jewish, I had no right to create these preppy clothes,” he said in the same 2002 interview.
After brief stints in college and the Army, young Lauren landed a job as a salesman for tie manufacturer Beau Brummell. That led to the creation of his own line, cut wide and made of unusual fabrics, in 1967. He named it Polo, a sport of the privileged. “I am promoting a level of taste, a total feeling,” the budding entrepreneur told menswear publication DNR at the time.
The following year, he added Gatsby-esque men’s suiting and, as the ’70s approached, tapestry-style shirts. Robert Redford paraded his dapper suits throughout 1974’s “The Great Gatsby,” leading to an Oscar for costume design.
His mood board is pulled from coast to coast. “I loved East Coast preppiness, the utility of the cowboy’s worn jeans, American folk art, the glamour of Hollywood, and the rich heritage of Native American craftsmanship,” Lauren told Elle magazine in August. “It’s always been there, right in front of us — on the streets, in the small towns, in the big cities — in the way people live.”
Lauren unveiled his tailored womenswear in 1971. Diane Keaton started a borrowed-from-the-boys trend when she wore his blazers, vests and ties in 1977’s “Annie Hall,” sparking huge sales.
His most enduring hit came in 1972 when he introduced Polo collared shirts. Frank Sinatra snapped up 20 in one go. By the late ’80s, hip-hop crews were rocking the ubiquitous status symbols. “And I’m doin’ pretty hood in my pink Polo,” Kanye West rapped on “Barry Bonds” in 2007.
Along the way, Lauren has dressed everyone from Gwyneth Paltrow and Drake to Melania Trump at her husband’s presidential inauguration.
Lauren’s hero pieces are instantly recognizable: the Polo shirt with its 982-stitch polo pony embroidered on the chest; the striped rugby shirt in heavy cotton; the crisp oxford-cloth button-down; and cozy cable-knit cashmere sweaters in tropical colors.
Throughout his professional life, Lauren has scooped up many honors, from France’s Chevalier de la Légion d’honneur to multiple CFDA fashion awards, and became the official outfitter of US Olympic and Paralympic teams, as well as the PGA of America and US Open Tennis Championships.
Although Lauren shows no signs of retiring, his party paid nostalgic tribute to his half-century-long era. Vintage runway footage was projected onto massive LED sculptures and archival images scrolled across the walls of a mirrored hallway.
But even the designer seemed wowed by the evening’s extravagance.
“It’s not that glamorous at home,” Lauren told the crowd. “I walk around in a ripped robe.”
Additional reporting by Serena French