Fashion Designer of the Month for October 2026
Calvin Richard Klein is an American fashion designer. Born in the Bronx, New York City, Klein began his pursuit of fashion after high school, when he enrolled in the New York Fashion Institute of Technology. Klein took a brief six-month absence after his first year, but returned to finish his degree.
Klein gained experience from his apprenticeship with Dan Millstein, an old-line cloak-and-suit manufacturer. Following that, Klein designed for other fashion shops in New York City for the next five years. At the same time, Klein networked with the help of Baron de Gunzburg, who helped connect him with the elite fashion scene in the city.
Eventually, Klein launched his first fashion company, Calvin Kein Limited, alongside his childhood friend. They began designing coats out of a hotel room converted into an office, until a buyer saw one of his collections at the New York City store Bonwit Teller. A year later, Klein would find himself on the cover of Vogue magazine.
This would lead to the success of Klein’s first jean line at the New York Fashion Week, which was called the new Yves Saint Laurent. 1968, he launched the company that later became Calvin Klein. In addition to clothing, he has also given his name to a range of perfumes, watches, and jewellery.
Klein’s company would skyrocket in popularity throughout the 1970s, and was the youngest at the time to win a Coty American Fashion Critics’ Award. By 1977, Calvin Klein was raking in around 30 million in annual revenue. The company would branch out from clothing to include jewelry and perfume in its catalog.
By the 90s, Klein’s company would push hard into men’s underwear and eventually become notable for its marketing in that particular clothing industry. Currently, Klein is recognized as part of a cohort of influential designers who came out of the Jewish community in the Bronx. He was one of several design leaders raised in the Jewish community in the Bronx, alongside Ralph Lauren and Robert Denning.
Klein has won numerous awards for his work, including multiple CFDA awards and an American Academy of Achievement’s Golden Plate Award.
