The Sunday Times - UK (2021-11-28)

Born and raised in Elmira, New York State,

Hilfiger was one of nine children; his father

was a jeweller and his mother a nurse.

Instead of going to a prestigious fashion

school, he started his career flogging second-

hand denim he had picked up in New York

City. Like many self-respecting Americans,

the first items of clothing he bought were

a pair of Levi’s and Converse sneakers. “I was

13 and they didn’t make boys’ sizes. So I

bought the smallest men’s size in Converse

and put tissue in the toes so they would fit,”

he says. “I had to sneak out of the house

because my parents didn’t want me wearing

really, really tight jeans. They thought that

was for, you know, the bad boys. I wanted to

be a rock’n’roll star, but I was tone deaf.”

So dressing like one was the next best

thing, and it was in fact the British rock scene

that inspired him to travel to London in his

twenties. “All of the style was coming from

London with the Beatles, the Stones and Led

Zeppelin. I would absorb all of what was going

on. And it was really so inspirational, because

the look and feel was revolutionary,” he says.

“It was a musical, political and fashion revolu-

tion. It was coming from Carnaby Street. It

was coming from the Kings Road.”

He frequented the iconic Mayfair night-

spot Tramp, alongside the likes of Rod

Stewart and Robert Plant. “On any given

night you would see all the most famous rock

stars in the world — in one place. And you

can only imagine the outfits.”

In 1969 Hilfiger opened People’s Place in

his hometown with two school friends, selling

flared trousers and fringed vests; it was also a

café and hair salon, and a place to smoke joints

and for bands who were passing through to

rehearse — Hilfiger nailed the “concept”

store idea long before they would exist in

modern retail. He expanded from one store

to a chain and later went bankrupt, before

moving to Manhattan and launching his

eponymous label in 1985. In 1992 his company

went public — and Tommy jeans, underwear,

trainers, hoodies and T-shirts went global.

Famously BFFs with Andy Warhol,

Hilfiger made celebrity hobnobbing a serial

profession in the Nineties, first by dressing

hip-hop stars such as TLC and Aaliyah (in

1994 Snoop Dogg wore Tommy Hilfiger on

Saturday Night Live and sales reportedly rose

by $90 million that year) and later Holly-

wood stars. “We really were the first brand

to do streetwear. When the hip-hop kids

started wearing my preppy clothes, they

would buy them four or five sizes too big,” he

says. “I created big logos, which had never

really been seen before. Logos were such a

no-no back in the Eighties — people were

repulsed by them. But I decided to make

mine enormous. And the styles were influ-

enced by sporting teams. The hip-hop kids

started wearing hockey jerseys with big,

baggy jeans and they would drop them down

around their hips, so you could see the logo

on the waistband, with baseball hats back-

wards and boom boxes on their shoulders.”

Fans of the label included Beyoncé, then

an unknown 16-year-old. “We were doing a

fashion show and our DJ cancelled. So my

brother Andy introduced me to this girl

group who offered to do the music for us.

Afterwards I said, ‘Who was the girl in the

middle? Her voice is incredible.’ He said her

name is Beyoncé,” Hilfiger recalls. “Later on

she became the face of our True Star

fragrance. And we became family friends.”

After more than 50 years in the game, it’s

more a case of who Hilfiger doesn’t know. He

was one of the first designers to sponsor

music tours (Britney Spears and Lenny

Kravitz, among others) and invite celebrities

to co-design collections: first was model Gigi

Hadid (“She was not really well known —

her mom was the reality star and Gigi was

sort of in and out of the picture occasionally,

but had a really great personal style”), then

Zendaya and Lewis Hamilton. “Lewis is a

fashionista. He loves fashion. He knows

exactly what he wants, what he likes, what

colours, what fabrics, how it fits, and he has

spent endless hours with the team devel-

oping the Lewis Tommy collection. I love

grand prix racing and we’ve been sponsoring

F1 for over 20 years.”

Indeed, he prides himself on still having

the ability to spot the next big thing, admit-

ting he’s a “student of culture”; he recently

dressed the in-demand young playwright

Jeremy O Harris for the Met Gala. The use of

celebrities to market his label has unasham-

edly been part of Hilfiger’s brand strategy

since the start. “You need a conduit for the

consumer. And you have to speak the

language of the consumer. The consumers

today are very much in touch with the celeb-

rity world.”

Rather than sell a wealthy Hamptons

fantasy, Hilfiger has always sold authenticity.

“We’ve been doing [inclusivity and diver-

sity] since I started People’s Place. That’s

50 years ago. I carried that into my Tommy

Hilfiger business for the past 35 years, and

it’s just a normal way of life for us,” he says.

“But other companies are just waking up to

it. We just think differently. And we’re always

thinking about how we can affect the public

in a positive way.”

This includes overseeing a purposeful

company. Last year, in the wake of the Black

Lives Matter protests, he founded the

People’s Place Program, “set up to mentor

young people of colour, unlock the door

for them within our industry. Giving back

is somewhat self-satisfying, because you

see you’re making a difference in people’s

lives. But also I think if a company is going

Below, from left Tommy Hilfiger outside his first store, People’s Place, which he opened in 1969; with wife Dee, daughters Kathleen and Ally,

granddaughter Harley, son-in-law Steve, daughter Elizabeth and son Richard backstage at the TommyNow autumn/winter 2016 catwalk show

The Sunday Times Style • 29