Eileen Fisher

Clothing Designer and Entrepreneur

"You don't have to be afraid of living alone."

   You only have to lay your eyes on Eileen Fisher's elegantly understated clothing to understand her talent for paring away the unessential. Now 55, presiding over one of the largest privately-held female-owned businesses in the country, she makes simplicity look sophisticated and the unadorned seem richly embellished.

    When she greeted me at the door of her house in Irvington, NY, her company's home base, Eileen was the embodiment of this sensual purity. Her hair is uncolored, but it's such a spectacular shade of white that you instantly consider forsaking L'Oreal. She moves like the yoga devotee she is-calmly and with pleasure. She runs a large company in the fashion industry but ignores trends in favor of designs that reflect her personal values. When the teen-aged Eileen and her five sisters madly primped in front of a mirror before going out, their mother used to chide them, saying, "Nobody is going to be looking at you." Now primping seems unnecessary and many people watch her.

    We should all be as productive while multi-tasking as Cokie Roberts, a 60-year-old political analyst for ABC and National Public Radio as well as a syndicated newspaper columnist. She spoke to me by phone from her basement office in Bethesda, Maryland, where several grandchildren played on the floor as she assembled the footnotes for her new book. Her career is studded with accolades, including the Edward R. Murrow Award and an Emmy. She's written three books, two of which have been best-sellers: We Are Our Mother's Daughters and From This Day Forward.