96 Words for Love

Join fashion superstar Rachel Roy and her daughter Ava Dash to celebrate the publication of a novel about how the past can empower your dreams for the future. They will be in conversation with Vogue magazine’s former arbiter of taste André Leon Talley. A modern retelling of the Shakuntala and Dushyanta, the greatest story of star-crossed lovers from Indian mythology, 96 Words for Love is a coming-of-age novel about finding your destiny in the most unexpected places—if you are open to the unknown.

About the Speakers

 

Rachel Roy is the daughter of an Indian immigrant father and Dutch mother. She is mother to Tallulah and Ava. Rachel is the founder and creative director of her eponymous brand and a tireless activist for using your voice to cultivate change in the world and to design the life you wish to live. Rachel founded Kindness Is Always Fashionable, an entrepreneurial philanthropic platform to help women artisans around the world create sustainable income for their families and communities. In 2018 Rachel was named a United Nations Women Champion for Innovation, and works for the UN advocating gender equality and other critical women’s issues. In 2015, Rachel published Design Your Life.

Ava Dash is the daughter of fashion designer Rachel Roy. She lives, works, and attends college in Los Angeles. Ava works with young adults who have aged out of the foster care system as well as girls who were formerly sex trafficked in India. Inspired from her travels with her mother, Ava hopes to start a give back business that provides critical resources to educate and empower the girls she has met on her travels to India.

André Leon Talley is a former Vogue editor, serving as contributing editor currently. His recent documentary, The Gospel According to André (Magnolia films), directed by Kate Novack, traces his early career and life through the glorious “chiffon trenches” of global fashion. He has curated four Oscar de la Renta exhibits since the designer’s death: SCAD Museum of Art in Savannah, Georgia; De Young Museum in San Francisco; Houston Museum of Fine Arts; and The Mint Museum in Charlotte, NC, in 2018. He is the author of numerous books, including his memoir, ALT, as well as Oscar de la Renta, the Little Black Dress (Rizzoli USA), which he edited, wrote, and directed, with the collaboration of the Savannah College of Art and Design. Currently he is working on his second memoir, to be published in 2020.