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The Incredible ZORAN , New York.
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As far as I know, Zoran is still designing for clients in his Tribeca salon. His clothes are also carried at selected Saks.
Zoran's number used to be 212-233-2025, but I have no idea if that's still current.
This is the only picture I could find of his work in a magazine, from Vogue 1986:
From NYT.com:
Reviews/Fashion; Zoran, the Master of Deluxe Minimalism, Still Provokes
By CATHY HORYN
Published: April 20, 1999
The remarkable thing about Zoran, the 52-year-old fashion designer, is not that he has grown rich by selling clothes that have changed little in 20 years or that he enjoys provoking retailers and clients with the occasional insult. No, the amazing thing is how someone with his practical wisdom and perverse assurance could still be such a fashion secret.
Think of Calvin Klein or Ralph Lauren, and instantly you get a picture of sleek models with ironed hair on the one hand, and on the other, of all-American beauties in an atmosphere of old money, authentic-looking right down to their prep-school faces and the chipped paint on the porch floor.
But Zoran? Zoran doesn't advertise, and even if he did it's doubtful it would do much good, since his clothes are almost indescribably plain, consisting of four or five solid colors, all in the same expensive fabrics, like cashmere and Tasmanian wool, yet minimally cut, without zippers or buttons -- a uniform, in effect. The look has been described as ''Gap for the very rich.''
Nor does Zoran put on fashion shows or court celebrities, the usual way for designers looking for publicity. In fact, the list of fashionable women that Zoran (like Halston, he uses only his first name) has dressed over the years -- Queen Noor, Candice Bergen, Lauren Bacall, Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis -- is almost as impressive as the number he says he has refused.
Not long ago, Zoran said, an assistant to Elizabeth Taylor phoned him to ask if the star could order some clothes. Zoran recounted the conversation in a heavy Balkan accent (despite having lived in this country 30 years). He recalled the underling asking: '' 'But why Mr. Zoran doesn't want to speak to Elizabeth Taylor? Every designer in the world wants to speak to her.' I said, 'There's always a first time.' She also wanted wholesale.'' The memory of this all-too-common request brought a gale of laughter through Zoran's iron-gray beard, which jiggles from his face like an eccentric Brillo pad.
''How can somebody who makes a lot of money ask that?'' he said. ''If I want something from Tiffany, do I call and ask for wholesale? How?''
Although Zoran is outgoing and ruthlessly funny and can weigh in on a variety of topics (''His politics are almost to the right of Beowulf,'' said the architect Hugh Newell Jacobson, who is designing his headquarters here), he and his business partner, Gary Galleberg, a former mergers and acquisitions lawyer at Cravath, Swaine & Moore, keep a low profile. They divide their time between this elegant old resort community on Florida's west coast and New York.
But Zoran can also be found in Milan, where they have a showroom, or in South Carolina, where he owns a plantation. There's no telling. When Gloria Vanderbilt, a longtime client, recently wanted to reach Zoran at his New York offices, which occupy a building he owns in TriBeCa, she had to call the socialite Anne Slater for the number. It's unlisted. (Mr. Galleberg said that's just to avoid solicitation calls.)
Even more intriguing, Zoran and Mr. Galleberg have been talking to Bill Blass about buying his business. The overture seems absurd, given that Zoran himself has no licenses, no perfumes, nothing that would qualify him to run a fancy Seventh Avenue house. As Mr. Galleberg said: ''We don't operate on the cocktail circuit. We don't need that constant schmooze factor.'' (They apparently don't need to fly first class, either. It's coach, all the way.)
While many of Zoran's better-known competitors are struggling to redefine themselves in a culture that has turned stubbornly casual, he is making millions at the one and only thing he does: fashion. His deluxe minimalism doesn't come cheap. Put together two or three pieces with one of his gossamer chiffon coats, and you're looking at a $3,000 ensemble.
Mr. Galleberg declined to disclose annual sales, but conversations with retail executives suggest that Zoran's volume is around $25 million in wholesale revenues, a number that has zoomed in the last five years as stores like Saks Fifth Avenue and Bergdorf Goodman (and in June, Neiman Marcus) have given his clothes a wider market. But revenues tell only part of the story. Because Zoran refuses to allow his clothes to be marked down, stores have an incentive to sell them at full price. ''They love it, of course,'' said Zoran, sitting on his patio. ''Who wouldn't take full markup?'' The upshot is that the profit margin for Zoran's clothing is among the best, usually neck and neck with Giorgio Armani. ''He's at the very top,'' said Philip B. Miller, the Saks chairman, who carries Zoran in 25 stores.
And because Zoran and Mr. Galleberg aren't inclined to spend money on advertising and expensive airline tickets, their profit margins are probably above the industry's norm of 10 percent. Mr. Galleberg declined to give specifics, but retail executives speculate that it could be 20 percent. Mr. Galleberg's term for it was ''giant.''
''Not giant,'' Zoran interjected with a wave of his hand. ''But nice.''
Anyone who spends time with Zoran quickly exhausts it listening to him. He is a champion talker, with little interest in books or television. (The last movie he said he saw was Truffaut's ''Breathless.'') And though his daily vodka intake seems enormous, he is usually up at 7 A.M. and on the phone by 9, discussing what sold the previous day in Boston or Beverly Hills. On this afternoon, dressed in a white T-shirt and khaki shorts, he looks as anonymous as any rich overachiever. Of his brand of T-shirt, he said: ''I don't know what it is. Sears & Roebuck. How could you wear fashion here, and why? And I hate to be stopped: 'Where did you get it?' '' He frowned. ''So if someone asked you where you got your T-shirt, and you say Sears, you close the subject.''
And in way, that's exactly what Zoran's anonymous-looking, logo-free clothes do: they silence the discussion about fashion.
He inspires amazing loyalty -- when you consider some of his imperious gestures, like installing a shower in his loft to remind private customers he didn't approve of makeup with his clothes. ''It was there for indication,'' Zoran said. ''And, of course, who was right? Look at Calvin, look at -- do they show jewelry or makeup now?''
Ms. Vanderbilt recalled being photographed for a magazine when one of Zoran's assistants, there to help, whispered that the red polish on her toes was taboo. ''I can't say I took it off,'' Ms. Vanderbilt said. ''But I did end up not wearing polish for a while.''
Joan Coleman, the theatrical producer, has been a faithful client for 20 years, and she rarely deviates. ''I never feel I look as good in other designers' clothes as I do his,'' said Ms. Coleman, who wore a white Zoran dress the night her show, ''Art,'' won a Tony. Ms. Vanderbilt gave another clue to Zoran's mystique. She was giving a book reading at an Upper East Side book store when he appeared. ''I was wearing, unfaithfully, an Armani suit, and Zoran had with him this beautiful chiffon stole, amber colored. He took it and draped it all over me so that the other outfit was completely covered.''
For the last couple of years, Zoran and Mr. Galleberg have been buying up real estate in Naples. Between them, they own three or four residential properties, as well a 10,000-square-foot commercial building formerly occupied by the Postal Service.
''I'm part of that generation that didn't belong to Seventh Avenue,'' Zoran said. ''So what's the difference, being in SoHo or Naples? To us, it's the same, if you look at it logically.''
For someone unencumbered with licenses who doesn't court the New York press, it is plausible to run a major fashion business from his own private Idaho.
Last year, the partners hired Mr. Jacobson, whose firm is based in Washington, to renovate the building because they plan to operate their business from Florida. At first, Mr. Jacobson said, he was baffled by Zoran's refusal to deal with routine matters like storage. ''He'd say, 'Don't talk about that. Think of it as Home Depot for girls,' '' Mr. Jacobson recalled. Eventually, the architect got Zoran's supremely simple concept, which was to allow the space to remain undefined -- not unlike his clothes, which present hundreds of combinations.
''He can talk abstractly in a way that very few architects I know can,'' Mr. Jacobson said, adding: ''He's a piece of work, isn't he? It's almost like working for the spooks out at the great white vault at the C.I.A.''
Correction: April 22, 1999, Thursday A fashion review of the designer Zoran on Tuesday misspelled the surname of a theatrical producer who is one of his customers. She is Joan Cullman, not Coleman.
Because of an editing error, the review also misidentified the director of ''Breathless,'' the 1959 film that Zoran said was the last he had seen. It was Jean-Luc Godard, not Francois Truffaut.
Zoran's number used to be 212-233-2025, but I have no idea if that's still current.
This is the only picture I could find of his work in a magazine, from Vogue 1986:
From NYT.com:
Reviews/Fashion; Zoran, the Master of Deluxe Minimalism, Still Provokes
By CATHY HORYN
Published: April 20, 1999
The remarkable thing about Zoran, the 52-year-old fashion designer, is not that he has grown rich by selling clothes that have changed little in 20 years or that he enjoys provoking retailers and clients with the occasional insult. No, the amazing thing is how someone with his practical wisdom and perverse assurance could still be such a fashion secret.
Think of Calvin Klein or Ralph Lauren, and instantly you get a picture of sleek models with ironed hair on the one hand, and on the other, of all-American beauties in an atmosphere of old money, authentic-looking right down to their prep-school faces and the chipped paint on the porch floor.
But Zoran? Zoran doesn't advertise, and even if he did it's doubtful it would do much good, since his clothes are almost indescribably plain, consisting of four or five solid colors, all in the same expensive fabrics, like cashmere and Tasmanian wool, yet minimally cut, without zippers or buttons -- a uniform, in effect. The look has been described as ''Gap for the very rich.''
Nor does Zoran put on fashion shows or court celebrities, the usual way for designers looking for publicity. In fact, the list of fashionable women that Zoran (like Halston, he uses only his first name) has dressed over the years -- Queen Noor, Candice Bergen, Lauren Bacall, Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis -- is almost as impressive as the number he says he has refused.
Not long ago, Zoran said, an assistant to Elizabeth Taylor phoned him to ask if the star could order some clothes. Zoran recounted the conversation in a heavy Balkan accent (despite having lived in this country 30 years). He recalled the underling asking: '' 'But why Mr. Zoran doesn't want to speak to Elizabeth Taylor? Every designer in the world wants to speak to her.' I said, 'There's always a first time.' She also wanted wholesale.'' The memory of this all-too-common request brought a gale of laughter through Zoran's iron-gray beard, which jiggles from his face like an eccentric Brillo pad.
''How can somebody who makes a lot of money ask that?'' he said. ''If I want something from Tiffany, do I call and ask for wholesale? How?''
Although Zoran is outgoing and ruthlessly funny and can weigh in on a variety of topics (''His politics are almost to the right of Beowulf,'' said the architect Hugh Newell Jacobson, who is designing his headquarters here), he and his business partner, Gary Galleberg, a former mergers and acquisitions lawyer at Cravath, Swaine & Moore, keep a low profile. They divide their time between this elegant old resort community on Florida's west coast and New York.
But Zoran can also be found in Milan, where they have a showroom, or in South Carolina, where he owns a plantation. There's no telling. When Gloria Vanderbilt, a longtime client, recently wanted to reach Zoran at his New York offices, which occupy a building he owns in TriBeCa, she had to call the socialite Anne Slater for the number. It's unlisted. (Mr. Galleberg said that's just to avoid solicitation calls.)
Even more intriguing, Zoran and Mr. Galleberg have been talking to Bill Blass about buying his business. The overture seems absurd, given that Zoran himself has no licenses, no perfumes, nothing that would qualify him to run a fancy Seventh Avenue house. As Mr. Galleberg said: ''We don't operate on the cocktail circuit. We don't need that constant schmooze factor.'' (They apparently don't need to fly first class, either. It's coach, all the way.)
While many of Zoran's better-known competitors are struggling to redefine themselves in a culture that has turned stubbornly casual, he is making millions at the one and only thing he does: fashion. His deluxe minimalism doesn't come cheap. Put together two or three pieces with one of his gossamer chiffon coats, and you're looking at a $3,000 ensemble.
Mr. Galleberg declined to disclose annual sales, but conversations with retail executives suggest that Zoran's volume is around $25 million in wholesale revenues, a number that has zoomed in the last five years as stores like Saks Fifth Avenue and Bergdorf Goodman (and in June, Neiman Marcus) have given his clothes a wider market. But revenues tell only part of the story. Because Zoran refuses to allow his clothes to be marked down, stores have an incentive to sell them at full price. ''They love it, of course,'' said Zoran, sitting on his patio. ''Who wouldn't take full markup?'' The upshot is that the profit margin for Zoran's clothing is among the best, usually neck and neck with Giorgio Armani. ''He's at the very top,'' said Philip B. Miller, the Saks chairman, who carries Zoran in 25 stores.
And because Zoran and Mr. Galleberg aren't inclined to spend money on advertising and expensive airline tickets, their profit margins are probably above the industry's norm of 10 percent. Mr. Galleberg declined to give specifics, but retail executives speculate that it could be 20 percent. Mr. Galleberg's term for it was ''giant.''
''Not giant,'' Zoran interjected with a wave of his hand. ''But nice.''
Anyone who spends time with Zoran quickly exhausts it listening to him. He is a champion talker, with little interest in books or television. (The last movie he said he saw was Truffaut's ''Breathless.'') And though his daily vodka intake seems enormous, he is usually up at 7 A.M. and on the phone by 9, discussing what sold the previous day in Boston or Beverly Hills. On this afternoon, dressed in a white T-shirt and khaki shorts, he looks as anonymous as any rich overachiever. Of his brand of T-shirt, he said: ''I don't know what it is. Sears & Roebuck. How could you wear fashion here, and why? And I hate to be stopped: 'Where did you get it?' '' He frowned. ''So if someone asked you where you got your T-shirt, and you say Sears, you close the subject.''
And in way, that's exactly what Zoran's anonymous-looking, logo-free clothes do: they silence the discussion about fashion.
He inspires amazing loyalty -- when you consider some of his imperious gestures, like installing a shower in his loft to remind private customers he didn't approve of makeup with his clothes. ''It was there for indication,'' Zoran said. ''And, of course, who was right? Look at Calvin, look at -- do they show jewelry or makeup now?''
Ms. Vanderbilt recalled being photographed for a magazine when one of Zoran's assistants, there to help, whispered that the red polish on her toes was taboo. ''I can't say I took it off,'' Ms. Vanderbilt said. ''But I did end up not wearing polish for a while.''
Joan Coleman, the theatrical producer, has been a faithful client for 20 years, and she rarely deviates. ''I never feel I look as good in other designers' clothes as I do his,'' said Ms. Coleman, who wore a white Zoran dress the night her show, ''Art,'' won a Tony. Ms. Vanderbilt gave another clue to Zoran's mystique. She was giving a book reading at an Upper East Side book store when he appeared. ''I was wearing, unfaithfully, an Armani suit, and Zoran had with him this beautiful chiffon stole, amber colored. He took it and draped it all over me so that the other outfit was completely covered.''
For the last couple of years, Zoran and Mr. Galleberg have been buying up real estate in Naples. Between them, they own three or four residential properties, as well a 10,000-square-foot commercial building formerly occupied by the Postal Service.
''I'm part of that generation that didn't belong to Seventh Avenue,'' Zoran said. ''So what's the difference, being in SoHo or Naples? To us, it's the same, if you look at it logically.''
For someone unencumbered with licenses who doesn't court the New York press, it is plausible to run a major fashion business from his own private Idaho.
Last year, the partners hired Mr. Jacobson, whose firm is based in Washington, to renovate the building because they plan to operate their business from Florida. At first, Mr. Jacobson said, he was baffled by Zoran's refusal to deal with routine matters like storage. ''He'd say, 'Don't talk about that. Think of it as Home Depot for girls,' '' Mr. Jacobson recalled. Eventually, the architect got Zoran's supremely simple concept, which was to allow the space to remain undefined -- not unlike his clothes, which present hundreds of combinations.
''He can talk abstractly in a way that very few architects I know can,'' Mr. Jacobson said, adding: ''He's a piece of work, isn't he? It's almost like working for the spooks out at the great white vault at the C.I.A.''
Correction: April 22, 1999, Thursday A fashion review of the designer Zoran on Tuesday misspelled the surname of a theatrical producer who is one of his customers. She is Joan Cullman, not Coleman.
Because of an editing error, the review also misidentified the director of ''Breathless,'' the 1959 film that Zoran said was the last he had seen. It was Jean-Luc Godard, not Francois Truffaut.
FUCHIMAMA
many thanks for the incredible treasure trove of info on ZORAN ...and i did google him and he was still active and creating in 2001 !.....i ight just call the tel no you provided.....although i did try to visit his stelier in NY in the early 90s..but was ........understandably not entertained ...[ i got as far as the street entrance buzzer !! ]
thanks again
many thanks for the incredible treasure trove of info on ZORAN ...and i did google him and he was still active and creating in 2001 !.....i ight just call the tel no you provided.....although i did try to visit his stelier in NY in the early 90s..but was ........understandably not entertained ...[ i got as far as the street entrance buzzer !! ]
thanks again
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