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Elizabeth von der Goltz, the fashion expert leading luxury retailers Browns Fashion and Farfetch, built a career on predicting what women want to wear. She tells us what is in and out in the fashion industry

- Pameyla Cambe

Nothing gets past Elizabeth von der Goltz. After a waitress took her order at the restaurant where we meet for this interview when she was in Singapore this May, she remarks, “I like how she’s wearing Chanel earrings.”

What women wear has always been Von der Goltz’s business. This year, the 50-year-old was appointed the chief fashion and merchandising officer of online luxury fashion retailer Farfetch. She also became the CEO of Browns Fashion, the influential London-based fashion retailer now owned by Farfetch. Before that, she worked at fashion e-commerce companies MatchesFashion and Net-a-Porter, as well as New York department store, Bergdorf Goodman.

Von der Goltz’s resume reads like a directory of where rich women shop. As for what they buy, she has an eye for that too. Her trend forecasts help retailers navigate fashion’s ever-changing universe and guide them to the next best thing, now. “It’s almost an instinctual feeling as to what’s going happen next,” she explains. “And it’s a risk; you’re not 100 per cent right all the time.”

She spots trends at fashion week in Paris, Milan, New York and London. But at the pace that fashion is moving, she now looks at more than just runway shows. Social media, she says, is “a massive way of finding talent”. She is also a keen observer.

“I’m a very visual person. I’m able to remember style,” says Von der Goltz, who credits that ability to her art history education. “I had to be able to look at a painting and know who the artist is. [I have] the ability to see something and be like, that’s from this designer, or from that collection.”