Vera Wang and husband Arthur Becker to divorce after 23 years

Celebrity wedding dress designer Vera Wang has separated with her husband Arthur Becker after nearly 23 years of marriage.

Wang has so far declined to comment on the split but her company’s president, Mario Grauso, issued the following statement to Women’s Wear Daily: “Vera Wang and Arthur Becker have mutually and amicably agreed to separate. They remain devoted parents to their two daughters.”

Becker, a former stock broker and CEO of technology company NaviSite, has been very heavily involved in building Wang’s fashion empire. Despite the announcement of their separation Wang will continue to work with him at her eponymous label. 

An unidentified friend of the designer’s has said the couple “will not let this impact the running of the company. They have worked too hard to build it up.”

Wang, 63, opened her first bridal salon in New York a year after her wedding in 1989, and her designs quickly became popular with Hollywood brides. The designer has made wedding gowns for Victoria Beckham, Mariah Carey, Kate Hudson, and Kim Kardashian as well as many US public figures including Chelsea Clinton and Ivanka Trump.

[Related gallery: Celeb brides who have worn Vera Wang wedding gowns]

The brand now produces ready-to-wear, fragrance, jewellery, eyewear, footwear and homeware collections.

In 2006 Wang gave insight into her decision to get married in an interview with New York Magazine. “I was the girl who nobody thought would ever get married. I was going to be a fashion nun the rest of my life. There are generations of them, those fashion nuns, living, eating, breathing clothes,” she said.

“But Ralph [Lauren] said, ‘Get yourself a husband and a family.’ Anna [Wintour] said, ‘You have got to get a family going here. You’ve been single for three decades now.’ So I married my husband.”

The couple have two daughters together, Cecilia, 22, and Josephine, 19.