CONVERSATION AT THE CROSBY: On Thursday evening, Diane von Furstenberg — after having sat the night prior for a Q&A session with Alina Cho at The Met — was playing the role of interviewer. She sat down with Lucy Yeomans, the global content director of Net-a-porter and the editor in chief of Porter magazine, as part of “CFDA Conversations,” an ongoing series of panel discussions for its members. Anna Sui, Maria Cornejo, Yeohlee Teng, Misha Nonoo, Carly Cushnie and Michelle Ochs, Veronica Swanson Beard and more turned out to the Crosby Street Hotel for the event.
First, the two discussed how they met and how Yeomans initially approached von Furstenberg for advice a few years ago when faced with the decision of whether or not to leave her former post as the longtime editor of Harper’s Bazaar U.K. for a new job at Net-a-porter. (Von Furstenberg, needless to say, told her to go for it.)
But the most compelling turn occurred when von Furstenberg asked why the company bothers to put out a print edition of Porter when the digital edition uses such innovative shoppable technology. “All we’ve done, the whole way through, is just ask [our consumer] what she wants,” Yeomans said, revealing the results of a global survey Net-a-porter conducted before launching their print glossy, in which most women said they valued print and enjoyed time away from technology. “That is the most important thing you can do as any kind of brand, is to listen to her. And that guided everything.”