Tom Ford: Fashion Designer, Founder of Tom Ford and Filmmaker

Tom Ford: Fashion Designer, Founder of Tom Ford and Filmmaker

Business Owner · Fashion & Apparel

New York City

Tom Ford, previously creative director at Gucci and Yves Saint Laurent, launched his own brand in 2005 and directed the films A Single Man and Nocturnal Animals.

About Tom Ford: Fashion Designer, Founder of Tom Ford and Filmmaker

Thomas Carlyle Ford (born August 27, 1961, in Austin, Texas) is an American fashion designer and filmmaker. He launched his eponymous fashion brand in 2005 after serving as creative director at Gucci and Yves Saint Laurent. He wrote and directed the films A Single Man (2009) and Nocturnal Animals (2016), and was chairman of the Council of Fashion Designers of America from 2019 to 2022. Ford was the son of realtors Shirley Burton and Thomas David Ford, and has a sister, Jennifer. He spent his early life in Houston and San Marcos, Texas, and at six rearranged furniture in the house and gave his mother advice on her hair and shoes. At 11 his family moved to Santa Fe, New Mexico, where he studied at St. Michael's High School and later Santa Fe Preparatory School. At 16 he enrolled at Bard College at Simon's Rock but quickly dropped out, then moved to New York City to study art history at NYU, dropping out after a year to focus on acting in television commercials. He began studying interior architecture at Parsons, frequenting Studio 54, whose disco-era glamor became a major influence on his later designs. Before his last year he spent a year and a half in Paris, interning in Chloe's press office, which inspired his interest in fashion. Sources: English Wikipedia (Tom Ford, accessed September 2026).

Basic Information

Founder and designer, Tom Ford brand; filmmaker

Company Details

Tom Ford

Fashion, Beauty, Film