Eileen Fisher: Effortlessly chic -- and empowering women

Tracie Keesee | October 25, 2013 | 6:00am

Saturday morning at Neiman Marcus is a great time to get together with a few close friends and share some sparkling Perrier water, few canapés and to marvel at the Eileen Fisher fall line. "Eileen Fisher is very in tune to what her customers want," according to Andrea Hockfick an Eileen Fisher "tipster." Tipsters, as they are known to loyal customers, are an extension of Eileen Fisher, delivering her message of style on behalf of the company and forwarding responses from the street to Fisher home base about what they liked and what they want. See also: Donna Karan Fall 2013

What they liked were the merino wool drape neck top in lava, the soft yak and heather block cardigan paired with the organic, waxed cotton, stretch ponte skinny pant made to look as if it were leather. Another favorite was the washable wool, flora jacquard short skirt, but the crowd went wild for the jersey harem pant that was converted into a knee length, bubble skirt when the model put her hands in the pant pockets and pulled up the legs, pandemonium.

Eileen Fisher Fall 2013

Eileen Fishers' effort to create and sustain women entrepreneurs is done each season and locally, where she has a retail presence. Her choice for Denver was the Women's Global Empowerment Fund (WGEF). The WGEF provides micro financing and microcredit to women in order for them to create viable opportunities for themselves and their families. WGEF, Executive Director, Karen Sugar shared with the shoppers that "to date, the Women's Global Empowerment Fund has distributed over 3500 loans," and Mary Ann Morella, regional merchandise manager for Eileen Fisher, also informed the group that five percent of all items sold on Saturday were donated to the fund, empowering.