Eva Chen Is The Final Guest On Our Incredible Women Podcast Season 8: The Powerhouses

From pre-med student to vice president of fashion at Meta is a pretty stellar professional pivot to get your head around, but for journalist, author and fashion powerhouse Eva Chen – the final guest in the eighth season of our Incredible Women podcast – it was the most satisfying change of course imaginable, solidifying a love of fashion and beauty instilled in her by her glamorous mother.

Chen’s plan was always to be a doctor. However, between her junior and senior years of college, she decided to apply for a raft of internships, to experience something “completely different” before embarking on a career in medicine. Of all the offers she received, only one was paid – and that was the clincher. It was a job at Harper’s Bazaar – and Chen knew instinctively it was where she belonged: “I could feel my soul just kind of strumming.” What followed was a steady climb through the echelons of glossy magazines – via ELLE and Teen Vogue – until, at just 33, she was hired by Anna Wintour to helm Lucky magazine, becoming the youngest editor-in-chief in Condé Nast’s history.

For the past nine years, Chen’s role at Meta has been to work closely with representatives from across the fashion industry to strategize different ways of storytelling on a platform that has become key for brands, retailers and influencers alike: she considers herself “the bridge” between the fashion industry and Meta. She’s an avid user of Instagram herself, with more than 2.5m followers. She also writes children’s books and has published 12 to date.

Listen in as Chen talks to NET-A-PORTER fashion director Kay Barron about the power of self-evolution, championing true creativity, and the ripple effect of our own personal power.

Read highlights from Eva Chen’s podcast episode below…

“I think power is something that’s ever shifting, ever changing, and that people should learn to embrace uncertainty and the shifting sands of themselves.”

“Fashion is very much a lightning rod. Fashion is very much a culture-carrier and a culture-changer.”

“It makes me have a lot of faith in humanity when you go into a classroom of first- or second-graders – the questions they ask and seeing just how bright and optimistic they are… gives me a lot of hope.”

“As long as I feel fulfilled and challenged, that’s always been the most important thing. That first itch of boredom [has] always been lethal for me.”

“This generation is a generation that is going to change the world. They have such strong morals and strong beliefs. And so, I think, in 2024, it’s about a powerhouse generation that I hope is coming to the forefront.”

To listen to The Powerhouses, subscribe via Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Google Podcasts and many more*

How to thrive in the workplace and create a good work/life balance is one of the most challenging dilemmas of modern living – and never more so than for women. Enter entrepreneur, creative consultant and writer Sharmadean Reid, MBE – the penultimate guest in this season of our Incredible Women podcast – who has made it her business, literally, to advocate for women’s economic independence and help build communities where they can create their own opportunities.

One of those communities, founded in 2017, was Beautystack, a next-generation beauty-booking app that aimed to economically empower women by giving them the tools to run their independent beauty businesses. The platform was described as an Instagram-LinkedIn hybrid, in that it focused heavily on the social aspect, though Reid liked to think of it more as the world’s biggest beauty salon – but with no set locations. This naturally evolved into The Stack World, launched in 2021, which offers its members rare access to advice from formidable figures in business, plus events, co-working spaces and its own magazine, which features articles on politics, culture and, of course, business.

Reid has now turned her wealth of experience and wisdom into a book: New Methods for Women: A Manifesto for Independence, a collection of 44 powerful essays that offer fresh perspectives on life, work, self, friendships, parenthood and relationships. It will be published in June.

Listen in as Reid talks to NET-A-PORTER fashion director Kay Barron about what power means to her, fixing the system, and putting women at the forefront.

Read highlights from Sharmadean Reid’s podcast episode below…

“My mum was a teen mum, and we didn’t have that much money. And I thought, well, if I want to have freedom, I need to have money; money and freedom were always very linked for me. I would say now, the power to change people’s minds and to redistribute wealth is a really important power marker for me.”

“We’ve got to do something different, clearly, because I don’t want my great-granddaughters in 100 years’ time to be like, ‘Oh, Grandma Reid’s still got it.’ I want future generations to read women’s issues today and look at them as absurd.”

“For the system to be fixed, women have to be active participants in it. But we can’t be participants in it if we’re already disempowered because of these things that are happening. So it’s this catch-22 thing, right?”

“It’s almost like you’re trying to bang on a door without knowing why the door’s even there and why you’re banging on it.”

“Every single thing I’ve done since then is somehow about putting women at the forefront; giving them their power.”

To listen to The Powerhouses, subscribe via Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Google Podcasts and many more*

There are countless stories and diverse depictions of the human experience that will forever remain untold on our screens, but award-winning writer-director Lulu Wang – the fourth guest in our Incredible Women podcast – is doing her damnedest to highlight as many of these ‘hidden’ tales as possible.

Central to this desire is Wang’s own story: she emigrated to the US with her family when she was six and, despite feeling completely settled now – “I have an actual home, I have a garden, I grow things and eat them and so I feel connected” – her background and culture proved key in the making of her deeply personal 2019 feature debut, The Farewell – a semi-autobiographical account of a granddaughter summoned back to China to await her grandmother’s death. The film won a handful of awards and was nominated for many more, including a Golden Globe and a Bafta.

Wang’s deft directing and unconventional storytelling caught the attention of Nicole Kidman, who was looking for someone to adapt, and direct her in, a Hong Kong-set novel by Janice YK Lee that she had optioned. The six-part result for Prime Video is the deeply unsettling Expats, a meditation on greed, grief, class and privilege. Unusually, the limited series was penned by an all-female writers’ room, where the experiences of a diverse set of women has imbued the project with a remarkably realistic female perspective. Wang’s next venture includes collaborating with her parents on a book and autobiographical podcast.

Listen in as Wang talks to NET-A-PORTER content director Alice Casely-Hayford about risk-taking, carving her own path, and the power of vulnerability.

Read highlights from Lulu Wang’s podcast episode below…

“There’s so much power in being quiet. Being quiet in a room is also a way of taking up space, of letting the silence sit…”

“Ultimately, if you’re good with yourself, if you make the choices that feel in line with your values and make you happy, you’re ultimately going to be a better person in the world; you’re going to be a more generous person; you’re going to be a more kind person, because you have more to give.”

[On Expats:] “I wanted to tell a story about humanity and the good and the bad; of all the flaws and all the beauty, and all the ways we hurt each other, and all the ways we try to love each other and sometimes fail.”

“I want to stay a student always and to keep learning.”

“How many actors are not given that opportunity to show what they can do, to show their range, because the roles aren’t there for them? Just thinking about that propels me forward to keep writing roles for people who don’t get these opportunities.”

To listen to The Powerhouses, subscribe via Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Google Podcasts and many more*

Writer. Activist. Feminist hero. Our third podcast guest, the indefatigable Gloria Steinem, has been at the forefront of the feminist movement since the 1960s. Even more compelling is that her fire for discourse and righting inequalities is undimmed as she celebrates her 90th birthday this month.

For someone who has made such an invaluable contribution to so many urgent issues of the past century, it is perhaps surprising to learn that Steinem didn’t regularly attend school – her family frequently traveled around the US when she was little, allowing her to see a life without the restrictions and beyond prejudices that she might have experienced in the classroom. Despite – and because of – this alternative way of living and learning, she grew up an avid reader, with a burning desire to write.

As a journalist, editor and writer, Steinem’s achievements are unequivocal: she was one of the founders of the iconic New York Magazine, which launched in 1968, where she wrote political columns and features; and in 1972, she co-founded Ms. Magazine, remaining one of its editors for 15 years. Her books include the bestsellers My Life on the Road and Moving Beyond Words.

Listen in as she talks to NET-A-PORTER content director Alice Casely-Hayford about her worldwide sisterhood, bringing women together, and celebrating – rather than punishing – differences.

Read highlights from Gloria Steinem’s podcast episode below…

“Power hopefully means the ability to govern our own lives and does not mean power over other people – which is, I think, where the problem begins.”

“[My father] always felt that the cure for almost anything was a movie and a malted. It’s kind of not wrong.”

“I still, to this day, have talking circles in my living room of 12 or 20 women, who come and sit and say what we’re doing and how we can help each other or learn from each other.”

“I remember being sent by my agent to an editor at Life magazine, I think. And as I approached his desk, he looked up at me and said, ‘We don’t want a pretty girl, we want a writer. Go home.’”

“It’s very important to me to meet with women who are different from me in culture or country or language or class or experience. Because, after all, we learn from difference, not sameness.”

To listen to The Powerhouses, subscribe via Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Google Podcasts and many more*

Most of us are driven by a desire to succeed; and yet, it’s failing – and everything we learn from it – that defines our second guest, who herself is a prodigy of the podcast world. Elizabeth Day is an award-winning journalist, bestselling author and the much-loved (and lauded) host of the wildly successful How To Fail, which is currently in its 20th season.

The simple premise – each week, a guest is invited to talk about three things in their life that they deem a failure and reflect on what it has taught them in the long run – was an instant hit with listeners when it launched in 2018. Day’s resulting book – How to Fail: Everything I’ve Ever Learned About Things Going Wrong – was an immediate bestseller.

Her latest book – Friendaholic: Confessions of a Friendship Addict – is a painfully honest examination of the difference between being good at friendships and being a good friend, and quickly topped The Sunday Times’ bestsellers list. Next up, Day is writing a piece of fiction and setting up a podcast production company, with an emphasis on championing a diverse representation of voices.

Listen in as she talks to NET-A-PORTER fashion director Kay Barron about the importance of listening, learning to say no, and what success really looks like for her…

Read highlights from Elizabeth Day’s podcast episode below…

“We have not paid enough attention to friendship as its own form of love; and that means we don’t have a unique language to reach for when we need to bring a friendship to a close.”

“I’ve got to the stage now where I refuse to be apologetic about the fact that I am busy and that my work is demanding – and I choose for it to be so, because it’s very meaningful to me and it gives my life purpose.”

“Doing How to Fail has made me radically redefine what success means to me. Success now means: not limousines and private jets – although that would be very nice; it means having the ability and the capacity to show up as myself in every single part of my life.”

“I want to allow [my guests] to go in unexpected directions and to really listen to what they’re saying, because very often the thing that is most important is the thing left unsaid.”

To listen to The Powerhouses, subscribe via Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Google Podcasts and many more*

For the eighth season of NET-A-PORTER’s Incredible Women podcast, in partnership with De Beers, we present The Powerhouses. In this series, we sit down for intimate conversations with six phenomenal women who are leading the charge for change with their unique talent, strength, drive and influence.

The lineup includes Gloria Steinem – as she celebrates her 90th birthday – who needs little introduction as a renowned leader of the women’s rights movement and an eminent writer and journalist; the award-winning actor, writer, producer and business founder Issa Rae, who starred in three of the biggest movies of the past year (Barbie, American Fiction and Spider-Man), and who has championed true representation onscreen throughout her career; Elizabeth Day, luminary of the podcast world, broadcaster and bestselling author, who hosts the chart-topping series How To Fail With Elizabeth Day; writer and director Lulu Wang, one of the most thrilling filmmakers of the moment, who received critical acclaim for her comedy-drama The Farewell in 2019 and whose recent TV debut, Expats, is one of 2024’s must-watch shows; and entrepreneur Sharmadean Reid, the beauty and tech founder who releases her first book this year: New Methods for Women, a manifesto on life, work and relationships.

Hosted by NET-A-PORTER’s content director Alice Casely-Hayford and fashion director Kay Barron, these conversations will give an eye-opening insight into the lives and work of these inspirational women.