Heritage
A house, in its own words
Jimmy Choo began not in a design studio but in a converted East End hospital, where Malaysian-born Jimmy Choo set up his shoemaking workshop in the late 1980s. He was distributing shoes at a local market stall when editors discovered his talent for recreating Manolo Blahnik's designs in any colour. His wife's niece Sandra Choi joined him in 1989, taking charge of design. Then Tamara Mellon—a Vogue accessories editor who had long requested Jimmy's help customising shoes—saw broader potential. She convinced him to build a ready-to-wear line, and in 1996, investors Tom and Ann Yeardye funded the venture with £150,000 for half the company. A pivotal HBO moment arrived in July 1998 when Carrie Bradshaw wore Jimmy Choos in Sex and the City, triggering an American retail race. By March 1999, the brand had dyed shoes to match actresses' Oscar dresses. Jimmy Choo himself sold his stake in 2001; Sandra Choi and Tamara Mellon continued steering the label. Today, Sandra Choi serves as Creative Director while the house operates over 200 boutiques globally. The fragrance arm, launched in 2011 under Inter Parfums licence, extended this universe of polished excess to the dressing table. Jimmy Choo positions fragrance as an extension of personal identity rather than mere scent. Tamara Mellon articulated this at launch: a woman's smell can identify her presence before she enters a room. The house designs its fragrances as accessories—completing an outfit, projecting a specific version of the wearer. This philosophy shapes everything from bottle silhouettes to note compositions: they skew toward the seductive, the sparkling, and the confidently feminine. The brand rejects subtlety as a design principle. Every Jimmy Choo scent should feel like a statement, an audible whisper across a crowded room. Olivier Polge, who later became Chanel's house perfumer, established this template with the debut women's fragrance, and subsequent releases have maintained that ethos of bold, glamorous presence.