Derek Lam (born 1967) is an American fashion designer. In addition to designing his own line, Lam was

Tod's Tod's S.p.A., also known as Tod's Group, is an Italian company which produces luxury shoes and other leather goods. The company is majority controlled by the founding family Della Valle Family and is listed on the Italy's Milan Stock Exchange be ...

creative director for ready-to-wear and accessories from 2005 until 2010.
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Background

Lam was born in San Francisco, California and is of

Chinese American Chinese Americans are Americans of Han Chinese ancestry. Chinese Americans constitute a subgroup of East Asian Americans which also constitute a subgroup of Asian Americans. Many Chinese Americans along with their ancestors trace lineage from ...

parentage. Lam is the youngest of three children in his fourth-generation family. His parents had a business that imported clothes from Asia, and his grandparents ran a successful garment factory in San Francisco that specialized in bridal and wedding dresses.Understated Elegance of Derek Lam
/ref> Lam graduated in 1990 from

Parsons School of Design Parsons School of Design, known colloquially as Parsons, is a private art and design college located in the Greenwich Village neighborhood of New York City. Founded in 1896 after a group of progressive artists broke away from established Manhatt ...

Manhattan Manhattan (), known regionally as the City, is the most densely populated and geographically smallest of the five boroughs of New York City. The borough is also coextensive with New York County, one of the original counties of the U.S. state ...

Career

Lam began working as an assistant for

Michael Kors Michael David Kors (born Karl Anderson Jr. August 9, 1959) is an American fashion designer. He is the chief creative officer of his brand, Michael Kors, which sells men's and women's ready-to-wear, accessories, watches, jewelry, footwear, and f ...

in the 90s and worked there for four years. Lam then moved to Hong Kong to work for a large retail brand. Following his Hong Kong experience, Derek returned to New York and was appointed vice President of Design for Michael Kors' ''Kors'' line. In 2003, he launched his own label. He debuted at the

New York Fashion Week New York Fashion Week (NYFW), held in February and September of each year, is a semi-annual series of events in Manhattan typically spanning 7–9 days when international fashion collections are shown to buyers, the press, and the general publ ...

in September 2003. In 2005, Lam won the runner-up prize in the CFDA/''Vogue'' Fashion Fund competition as well as the CFDA Perry Ellis Swarovski Award for new designers. In addition to clothes, Derek Lam and Derek Lam 10 Crosby brands have shoes, handbags and eyewear collections. In February 2010, Derek Lam launched an e-commerce website selling the collections of ready-to-wear and accessories. In 2015, a fragrance collection was launched under the Derek Lam 10 Crosby brand. In 2009, Lam opened a store designed by the Japanese architecture firm, SANAA, but it eventually closed. In January 2020, Public Clothing Company acquired the Derek Lam brand. Lam remains the Chief Creative Officer of the Derek Lam business, including Derek Lam 10 Crosby. He closed his luxury collection to focus more on Derek Lam 10 Crosby and its expansion to contemporary styles. Regarding the sale, Lam said in an interview, “Dan and his team have a tremendous opportunity to grow the branded business, both geographically and with new product categories. There’s a huge opportunity in international that has essentially been untapped." Lam is also incorporating sustainable fashion into his collections. Lam is using non-chromed leather and eco-viscose in his designs. Use of recycled cashmere and polyester and raw eco materials in knitwear are also areas he is expanding upon. In one of his interview Lam said the most challenging part my job is many people are using the product now and its not only about me if I want to launch any new design, we always have in our mind people are going the use and there will be huge response from them
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Personal life

Lam is married to Jan Hendrik-Schlottmann (born 1964/65), also his business partner. Lam lives in

Gramercy Park Gramercy ParkSometimes misspelled as Grammercy () is the name of both a small, fenced-in private park and the surrounding neighborhood that is referred to also as Gramercy, in the New York City borough of Manhattan in New York, United States. T ...

, Manhattan.Tastemakers – Derek Lam
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Filmography

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Seamless Seamless may refer to: * Seamless (company), an online food ordering company * "Seamless", a 2015 song by Sabrina Carpenter from '' Eyes Wide Open'' * "Seamless", a song by American Head Charge from the 1999 album ''Trepanation'' and the 2001 alb ...

'', 2005

References

External links