From Zagreb To Paris

WHEN DESIGNER Ivana Omazic, 32, decided to leave home in the former Yugoslavia to study fashion in Milan, it was a very emotional decision. “The war made it very difficult to leave my family,” she says. But she had known since age 5 that clothes would be her career, so she went to study at the European Institute of Design in Milan. In 1998, Omazic landed a job working for Miuccia Prada, which is when she learned to marry high-tech fabrics with feminine shapes. After seven years at Prada, Omazic was named creative director of Céline in July the first female to hold that post since Céline Vipiana founded the house 60 years ago. Omazic plans to bring femininity back to the label. —By Kate Betts