Michael Kors

The founder of the eponymous brand, Michael Kors started designing as an infant and is committed to elegant, sporty and streamlined fashion.

Having started his own label in 1981, the American designer became still more famous in 2004 when he starred as a regular on reality TV show Project Runway and has seen his company become an international, multi-billion dollar brand listed on the New York Stock Exchange.

His signature look is all-American, sporty luxury, with simple clean lines. Mr Kors’ decision to design fashion may have been influenced by his mother’s career as a model.

Born on August 9th 1959 as Karl Anderson Jr and starring as a child actor in commercials, Mr Kors designed his mother’s wedding dress for her second marriage when he was five years old.

He became Michael Kors when he took his stepfather Bill Kors’ surname, telling People magazine that his mother had said “You’re getting a new last name, so why don’t you pick a new first name?”

In his teens, the precocious designer founded a mini boutique called Iron Butterfly in the basement of his parents’ home in Long Island, New York, selling clothing and other items he had designed and made.

Commencing a course at Manhattan’s Fashion Institute of Technology, he left before completing it to work as an in-house designer for French boutique Lothar’s before launching his women’s collection in 1981.

In 1993 Michael Kors the company was forced to file for bankruptcy, but has undergone a transformation in the intervening years and even produced the dress worn by Michelle Obama for her first official portrait as First Lady.