11/19/2020
Ralph Lauren was born in The Bronx, New York City,to Ashkenazi Jewish immigrants, Frieda (Cutler) and Frank Lifsh*tz, an artist and house painter, from Pinsk, Belarus.
He is the youngest of four siblingsβtwo brothers and one sister.
Lauren attended day school followed by the Manhattan Talmudical Academy, before eventually graduating from DeWitt Clinton High School in 1957.
He went to Baruch College, at the City University of New York (CUNY) where he studied business, although he dropped out after two years.
From 1962 to 1964 he served in the United States Army and left to work briefly for Brooks Brothers as a sales assistant before becoming a salesman for a tie company.
The Ralph Lauren Corporation started in 1967 with men's ties. At 28 years old, Lauren worked for the tie manufacturer Beau Brummell, where he convinced the company's president to let him start his own line.
Drawing on his interests in sports, Lauren named his first full line of menswear 'Polo' in 1968. He worked out of a single "drawer" from a showroom in the Empire State Building and made deliveries to stores himself.
By 1969, the Manhattan department store Bloomingdale's sold Lauren's men line exclusively. It was the first time that Bloomingdale's had given a designer their own in-store boutique.
What an interesting start!!!
