Biography

Wilbert Das was born in 1963 and spent his formative years working on his parents dairy farm in the small village of Riethoven in the South of Holland. At age 19 he left Riethoven to study fashion design at the Academy of Fine Arts in Arnhem, where he received his diploma in 1988. Intrigued by the revolution that was taking place in Italian fashion, after graduating from Arnhem Das travelled to Italy for an interview with clothing manufacturer Renzo Rosso

Renzo Rosso

Renzo Rosso is an Italian fashion entrepreneur. Referred to as the "Jeans Genius" by Suzy Menkes, he is the founder and President of fashion brand Diesel...

, the owner of the fashion brand Diesel). Das was offered a job on the spot and started working at Diesel that day in the role of assistant male designer on the Male, Accessories, Leather and Kids lines, but was soon directing the entire style office. In 1993 Das was recognized with the title of Creative Director, with broad responsibilities ranging from directing all clothing & accessory design to overseeing advertising and communications, retail and interior design, merchandising as direction of events and fashion shows.

Collection Design

During Das's early years with Diesel, the company became most famous for its denim collections. Throughout this time Diesel pioneered many techniques to age jeans and give them a more vintage feel, including experimentation with dyes, destruction, movement of pockets, reshaping and introduction of curves.

In subsequent years, under Das's creative direction Diesel introduced collections of footwear, eyewear (Diesel Shades), jewellery (Diesel Jewellery), and watches (Diesel Timeframes). The accessories ranges of Diesel became some of the most well recognized in their sector, with sunglasses and watches in particular known for their industry-leading designs as well as commercial success. Diesel Timeframes watches alone have grown to nearly 100 million euros per year in sales.

Communications & Advertising

As well as being responsible for the development of all Diesel's fashion and accessories collection, in his role as Creative Director, Das also oversaw the creative aspects of every Diesel campaign from the time the company began advertising until 2009. Nike chairman Phil Knight has been quoted as saying that advertising should be divided into two ages, that before Diesel, and that after. The influence of Diesel’s communications campaigns, published under the umbrella label “For Successful Living”, have won Diesel and Das numerous awards innumerable Grand Prix, Gold, and ‘Advertiser of the Year’ awards at the International Festival of Advertising at Cannes.

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