Interview with Jimmy Choo

Awards and Achievement

International Footwear Designer Extraordinaire

He has earned a lot of awards and his work were admired and he has been credited globally for his art of designing. 

• In the year 2000 he was bestowed a state award carrying the title of Dato' by the Sultan of Pahang state in Malaysia for his achievements.
• In the year 2002 he was conferred an OBE by Queen Elizabeth II in recognition of his services to the shoe and fashion industry in the UK.
• In the year 2004 Choo was awarded the Darjah Setia Pangkuan Negeri by the Yang di-Pertua Negeri (Governor) of his home state of Penang, which also carries the title Dato'.
• He has also been awarded a fellowship by the University of the Arts London, conferring the use of the title Professor.
• Jimmy Choo has been honoured by the Hong Kong Design Centre (HKDC) with the Outstanding Chinese Designer Award 2011.

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Becoming Global

Tamara Mellon, C.E.O Vidal Sassoon Company

Tamara Mellon the C.E.O. of the Vidal Sassoon Company, used to work as an assistant to fashion director Sarajane Hoare at British Vogue in 1990. Hoare quickly saw that this quiet young thing had an obsession with shoes that was extraordinary even by fashion-magazine standards,” Vanity Fair will later report. After a time, Mellon will begin regularly visiting Hackney cobbler Jimmy Choo. After she is appointed accessories editor at the magazine, she will collaborate with him frequently. 

Jimmy Choo and his niece, Sandra Choi 

Choo is turning out two collections—of 24 styles each—per year. He has been joined in his studio by his niece, Sandra Choi, who enrolls at the elite London design school Central Saint Martins. Though her interest is in clothes, Choi’s work at her uncle’s studio will become so all-consuming that she will quit Central Saint Martins after a year to work with him full-time. Now, she is the creative director of Jimmy Choo starting last April 2013. 

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International Stores

The interior design of Jimmy Choo's store

The first official Jimmy Choo store was opened in 1996 on Motcomb Street in London, complementing a distribution in some of the most prestigious multi-brand stores in the world. Two years later, the company expanded to the US, opening two stores in New York City and Beverly Hills. International expansion continued with Jimmy Choo securing locations in the premiere luxury shopping destinations of the world’s most prestigious cities including Sloane Street and Bond Street in London, Avenue Montaigne in Paris, Via Condotti in Rome, Madison Avenue in New York, Rodeo Drive in Beverly Hills, and Ginza in Tokyo. His very first store was actually a converted hospital in Hackney, a working-class area of London. Among his neighbors at the onetime hospital is designer Alexander McQueen. Around this time, Princess Diana comes across Choo’s work and begins commissioning pairs from him. He will visit her at Kensington Palace, and do one-offs for runway shows.

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The First Shoe

 

Example of shoes the man designed

Jimmy Choo made his first shoe when he was 11. Whenever his father was working, Jimmy would take a look and secretly learned the skills and techniques. His father wouldn't let Jimmy make the shoes instead he asked Jimmy to sit and watch. 

"When I first started, my father wouldn’t let me make a shoe. Instead, he said: ‘Sit and watch, sit and watch.’ For months and months, I did that."
– Jimmy Choo

Before Jimmy went to London, he was one of the apprentice of a shoemaker named Wong Sam Chai, he was considered a very skilled shoemaker in Penang back in the days. Jimmy Choo graduated with honors in the year 1983 even though he had a rough time trying to manage his financials. He had to work in a restaurant and in a shoe factory as a cleaner for him to survive in London. Jimmy was considered as a notable student in that college and after he graduated he worked in a shoe factory. He met his wife, Datin Choo, here in London. She was also one of the students in that college. His wife is also a very talented shoe designer. During that time, Jimmy managed to learn more about production of shoes. His first footwear sold under the brand named Lucky Shoes around the year 1984. 


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The Choo Story

The man who made Malaysia proud, Jimmy Choo. 

Who would've thought a boy who was brought up in Penang would become famous all around the world? The man who goes by the name Jimmy Choo is famous for designing shoes. Born in 1961, Jimmy Choo or Chow Yeang Keat had a very humble upbringing where his family lived in Hutton Lane near the busy side road of Penang Road. His father who was also a shoemaker would make shoes and sell them to shoe shops around Penang. He knew that he wanted to follow his father footsteps in making shoes. Jimmy Choo, who managed to finish only 6 years of school got the chance to further study in Cordwainers Technical College, London because he wanted to be a designer, he didnt want to be an ordinary shoe maker. His father was determined to send him to London despite the insufficient fund but he didnt see it as an obstacle, to him it was a chance and he finally left Penang for London in year 1980. 


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