A Vera Wang original may bring oohs and ahs as a bride walks down the aisle, but the Vera Wang original worn by Nathan Chen as he won a figure skating gold medal had a far from enthusiastic reception on social media.
Chen’s orange shirt was somewhat evocative of a “Star Trek” uniform, with bright bursts of stars, and fit his choice of “Rocket Man.” But Wang’s silver threads and golden needles couldn’t save Chen from a trolling.
“Another day, another horrendous shirt,” one user tweeted. “Nobody hates Nathan Chen more than Vera Wang and I respect her for that,” another user tweeted, and it turns out that could not be further from the truth.
Wang, a former skater who just missed out on qualifying for the 1968 Olympics, has designed for some of the sport’s biggest stars, including Nancy Kerrigan, Michelle Kwan and Evan Lysacek. The shirt Chen wore Thursday was a toned-down version of the one he wore during the U.S. Figure Skating Championships last month.
“When I see a skater out there, and I know what’s gone into it, and that I’m still being asked, it’s a great privilege,” Wang recently told NBC. “I always say I’m not doing this again. I said it after Nancy. I said it after Michelle. I said it after Evan. I said it after Nathan. I said: ‘That’s it! I’m hanging up my sewing machine, my needles.’
“But the truth is that it also affects my work. I think when I take on a project like this, it is so out of the realm of what we normally do that it forces me into that lack of comfort zone, way out of my comfort zone. Yet, it always brings something to me, something other than the participation. It makes me feel that I can expand my own creativity in another way, and that’s also very rewarding.”
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