Come to Laurenland, the images whisper, where fantasy and finery go together like hand in well-stitched glove. Watch polo matches in Palm Beach, trim in a crested blazer and trousers of crisp linen. Sip cognac by the fireplace of a Sun Valley, chalet, snug under a brightly colored Navajo blanket and clad in a Nordic apres-ski sweater and wool twill slacks. Go on safari in Kenya wearing a bush jacket and khaki shorts that would do justice to Robert Redford in Out of Africa. Sip tea at London's Connaught Hotel, draped to perfection in a chalk-stripe suit.
Fashion Designer Ralph Lauren grew up a long way from all the things he really admired: hand-tailored clothes, manor houses, sports cars, fine horses and manicured lawns. But call it a yearning process: as an outsider to that world, Bronx-born Lauren dreamed up his own brand of gentility and style. Now he has managed to create an image and a company that have nearly cornered the market for supplying today's would-be Gatsbys. Shunning hipness and flamboyance, Lauren cultivates the up-and-coming customer's appreciation for things and dreams that last.
Lauren (pronounced Laur-en) has tailored a thriving conglomerate as well. Rarely if ever has a clothing designer established a product range so wide, a retailing network so extensive, a marketing image so well defined. That company, Polo/Ralph Lauren, expects total retail sales to hit $1.3 billion this year, a fourfold jump since 1981. If Lauren's company were publicly held, its retail revenues would place it 257th in this year's FORTUNE 500 listings. The designer's personal wealth is estimated to be $300 million, plus whatever he keeps after taxes this year on his projected 1986 profits of about $27 million. Lauren, his wife Ricky and their three children -- Andrew, 17, David, 14, and Dylan, a daughter, 12 -- now live like restless aristocrats, shuttling by private jet among their homes in New York, Colorado and Jamaica.
In the ranking of the world's designer royalty, Lauren, 46, is the king of American sportswear, which in today's fashion parlance encompasses everything from swimsuits to semiformal evening wear. He reigns as the natural successor to Bill Blass and John Weitz, the first generation of U.S. celebrity designers. Lauren's chief rival, as coincidence would have it, comes from the same Bronx neighborhood. He is Calvin Klein, who has crafted an image of sizzling sexiness as singular as Lauren's aura of rich romance. But Lauren has kept ahead of his onetime neighbor in both popular and negotiable currency: Lauren's total sales are estimated to be one-quarter larger than Klein's. Overall, the U.S. champion money spinner appears to be Designer Liz Claiborne (estimated 1986 sales: $1.8 billion), whose company sells primarily mid- priced clothes for professional women. But in terms of product range, prestige and marketing mystique, Lauren is the leader (see chart).
Lauren sells an image of ready-to-wear prosperity, but there was nothing instant about his success in New York City's gritty garment district. He worked hard, sold hard and survived countless trials and errors. His early lack of strategic planning brought him close to bankruptcy in 1972. In the late 1970s, his Western Wear collection thrust Lauren into the fashion spotlight but failed financially.