Too Young to Be Old: How to Stay Vibrant, Visible, and Forever in Blue Jeans

I don’t usually enjoy many memoirs, but this one was one of my very favorites! It was so witty it kept me hooked!

From abused child to the queen of home shopping blue jeans sales, Diane Gilman’s life has been filled with challenges and triumphs, setbacks and success. Claiming her biggest business success after passing the age of sixty, Ms. Gilman sets out to encourage readers fifty-plus to live their best life without feeling invisible or irrelevant.

Diane Gilman’s story is impressive as she faced and conquered personal, business and health challenges with optimism, courage and strength. From rocker chick in the 1960s to Jeans Queen in 2022, Ms. Gilman shares it all…losing the love of her life, losing the legal right to use her own name on her designs, fighting breast cancer in her seventies. And through it all, designing clothes from blouses to washable silk fashions to blue jeans for women with real bodies.

The writing is personal and upbeat, seeking to connect with the reader, offering twenty-five tips for a energetic and visible Act 3 of your life.

It’s an easy read and you feel like Ms. Gilman is chatting with you and sharing her secrets and tips. I may just have to check out some DG2 jeans!

My expectations were low. Firstly, I had never heard of Diane Gilman, and I feared there would be a lot of psycho-babble or worse. US readers will probably know the name right away. Diane became a millionaire in her 60s after creating a line of blue jeans especially for Baby Boomers. The range, DG2, became a sensation on a TV selling channel.

Diane was always keen on fashion and design and as a teenager created embellished jeans by hand that were worn by Janis Joplin and Jimi Hendrix.

Her book is partly autobiographical with the last chapters giving her 25 Lessons for Life. Diane has always lived life to the full, and prides herself on being energetic, colourful and exuberantly dressed.

She has some profound learnings and lessons for mid life women. She tells us to embrace our age of illumination, and uses data and real life examples to explain how older women often shine in their later years, becoming entrepreneurs, as she did, and carrying a torch for a successful and joyful final act. We don't hand over that torch either. We carry it to the end.

Of the phrase "Diamonds are Forever," she adds: "The girl is the diamond. Created by pressure, polished and buffed, given a shining second chance at life."

Diane Gilmore's life hasn't always been easy. She sold a range of washable silks and was naive about the business arrangement which meant she lost the right to use her own name as a brand. She ignored a mammogram that suggested a dark shadow, and three years later, in her 70s, discovered the cost of ignoring it when she found she had to battle breast cancer.

I found the book very uplifting and inspiring. For a cynical Brit who doesn't care for advice or self help books, that's quite an accolade.

This title will be released on November 29.