Gabriela Hearst

Gabriela Hearst founded her namesake label in 2015 and ran it alongside Chloé from 2020 to 2023. Raised on a cattle and merino-sheep ranch in Uruguay, she has made the origin and longevity of materials central to both businesses. Her tailoring, knitwear and tightly structured Nina bag give that interest a recognisable shape. (Associated Press, via CNN; Business of Fashion)

Hearst talks about clothes as things to keep. She has used wool from her family’s ranch, deadstock cloth and carefully documented supply chains, while making pieces with the polish and finish expected of luxury fashion. The point is visible in the garments themselves: substantial coats, finely worked knitwear and bags built to be carried for years. (Gabriela Hearst; TIME)

From a Uruguayan cattle ranch to New York's garment district

Hearst grew up on Santa Isabel, her family's cattle and merino-sheep ranch in Uruguay. She still helps manage the property, and its wool has become one of the materials she knows most closely. Her move to New York came before she started making clothes under her own name. (Business of Fashion; WWD)

In 2003 she and two partners founded Candela in Brooklyn with a $700 investment each, beginning with silk-screened T-shirts printed with a winged woman on horseback, a motif drawn from a photograph of her mother; the line expanded into ready-to-wear and footwear by 2006 and reportedly turned over $1 million in its first year. (Gabriela Hearst) Candela ran until 2015, giving Hearst more than a decade running a fashion business — pattern development, production, wholesale accounts — before she started the label that carries her married name.

A label built on "a long-term view and sustainability"

Hearst launched her eponymous womenswear line for Autumn/Winter 2015, debuting the collection at an intimate event in her own West Village townhouse rather than a staged show. (W Magazine; Gabriela Hearst) The early collections built the label's identifying vocabulary: structured tailoring, sculptural knitwear, and suiting cut from traceable merino wool that had previously been wholesaled from the family ranch — a sourcing decision she has credited to her husband, Austin Hearst. (Gabriela Hearst)

Her first runway show, in February 2017, was built around the same principle applied to the presentation itself: roughly 30 percent deadstock fabric in the collection — cloth left unsold or unused by mills that would otherwise go to landfill — no plastic anywhere in front- or back-of-house, furniture borrowed from her own home and office, and cashmere pillows for guests made from leftover yarn by the Uruguayan weaving cooperative Manos del Uruguay. (Gabriela Hearst) The same year, she won the womenswear category of the 2016/17 International Woolmark Prize, telling the judges she wished her grandfather and father could see it and that she intended to "promote more Merino wool in the world" as the fibre of the future — a direct line back to Santa Isabel. (Woolmark Prize) LVMH Luxury Ventures took an undisclosed minority stake in the company in January 2019, an early institutional bet on a label that was still five years from its first house appointment. (WWD)

Her most recognisable object is the Nina bag, a structured top-handle style introduced with the label's early collections and named in tribute to Nina Simone. It became one of the house's best-selling and most waitlisted pieces. (Gabriela Hearst) In April 2026 Hearst released a 25-piece hand-painted edition of the bag with the artist Adam Pendleton, sold through Sotheby's, with proceeds benefiting the Nina Simone Childhood Home in North Carolina — evidence that the bag's original reference point still anchors the brand two decades on. (Gabriela Hearst; WWD)

On 14 September 2020, the CFDA named Hearst its Womenswear Designer of the Year — her first CFDA award, decided over a field that included The Row's Ashley and Mary-Kate Olsen, Brandon Maxwell, Marc Jacobs and Tom Ford — a recognition that arrived less than three months before Chloé approached her. (Refinery29; WWD)

Bringing her methods to Chloé

Chloé named Hearst its creative director on 7 December 2020, days after confirming the exit of Natacha Ramsay-Levi; she continued to design her own label in parallel, showing her first Chloé collection in March 2021. (Richemont; Fashionista) The appointment made her the first Latin American designer to lead a major Paris house, and the assignment was explicitly framed around her sustainability record: under her direction, Chloé became the first luxury maison to receive B Corp certification — an independent audit of a company's entire social and environmental performance, not just its products — on 18 October 2021, after roughly eighteen months of work. (Vogue Scandinavia; WWD)

Weeks into the role, Hearst designed the ivory silk-and-wool dress and cashmere coat that Jill Biden wore to the evening celebrations of the 2021 presidential inauguration, embroidering the bodice with the federal flowers of every state and territory plus the District of Columbia as a unity motif; both pieces were made in New York's garment district using existing fabric stock to limit waste. (CNN) Jill Biden donated the ensemble to the Smithsonian's First Ladies Collection in a ceremony on 25 January 2023. (Smithsonian Institution)

Chloé confirmed Hearst's departure on 6 July 2023; she stayed on through her final collection, for Spring/Summer 2024, shown on 28 September 2023. Richemont's fashion and accessories chief Philippe Fortunato credited her with laying "strong foundations for future growth" in sustainability, and Hearst said she felt "empowered and excited" by the work done at the house; the split was widely described as amicable, freeing her to concentrate on her own, faster-growing label. (Forbes; Euronews)

Since Chloé: recognition, expansion and a return to Montevideo

Days before that final Chloé show, the Museum at FIT's Couture Council gave Hearst its 2023 Award for Artistry of Fashion, recognising both her own label and her work at Chloé. (WWD) She has continued to show her own label in Paris, including a Fall 2026 collection, and remains its creative director as of September 2026. (WWD)

At the 2024 Met Gala, the actress Lily Gladstone wore a custom black gown and cape Hearst co-created with the Kiowa jeweller Keri Ataumbi: 493 stars hand-embroidered in recycled silver and glass beads across the cape, arranged to depict the night sky over the Great Plains on the summer solstice, including Orion and the Pleiades, at Gladstone's request, positioned at the neckline as a closure. The piece took more than 120 hours to embroider and drew on Kiowa and Blackfeet beliefs that the dead return to the stars. (Yahoo Entertainment; Gabriela Hearst) It is one of the clearest examples of Hearst working outside her own atelier's usual references, developing a design in direct collaboration with the wearer's own cultural authority rather than her own.

The label has since moved to expand well beyond its original knitwear-and-tailoring core: in March 2025 the company set out plans to roughly double its store network within three years and to push further into footwear and jewellery, promoting Michele Cohen to brand president to run that growth, with a Paris store reported for early 2026. (Modaes) In June 2026 Hearst returned her design directly to Uruguay, unveiling bespoke tailored uniforms for the national football team, La Celeste, ahead of the FIFA World Cup: merino-wool jackets and trousers lined in silk jacquard woven with the national coat of arms, each with a player's name hand-embroidered inside, presented at the Estadio Centenario in Montevideo. (WWD)

Reading the labels: one name, three overlapping eras

The Gabriela Hearst label has carried her own collections since 2015. Early pieces predate her February 2017 runway debut and may have no show image to compare against; later collections can be checked against the season’s presentation and the brand’s material notes. A label alone does not establish which fibre or production method was used in a particular piece. (Gabriela Hearst)

A separate distinction applies to anything made between December 2020 and September 2023: during that window Hearst was designing two lines simultaneously, but the two are never conflated on a single garment. A piece labelled Chloé from those seasons is a Hearst-era Chloé design regardless of when it reached a shop floor — as with any creative director's tenure, retail delivery can outlast the design season, so a Chloé item sold into 2024 may still record a 2023 or earlier collection code. A piece labelled with her own name from the same years belongs to her label and has no connection to her Chloé work, however similar the silhouette might look at a glance. Reading the two apart requires the label and the season code together, not the date of sale.

References

• Wikidata. "Gabriela Hearst (Q29861764)." Accessed September 2026.
• Business of Fashion. "Gabriela Hearst." BoF 500 profile.
• CNN, via Associated Press. "Gabriela Hearst to step down as creative director of Chloé." 6 July 2023.
• Gabriela Hearst. "Gabriela Hearst Timeline." Company history.
• Gabriela Hearst. "Why Making Things That Stand the Test of Time Matters."
• TIME. "Why Gabriela Hearst Considers Sustainable Fashion to Be the Ultimate Luxury." Earth Awards 2024.
• W Magazine. "Gabriela Hearst Opens Up Her Home for Her First Collection." 2015.
• Woolmark Prize. "Gabriela Hearst wins 2016/17 womenswear International Woolmark Prize."
• WWD. "LVMH Luxury Ventures Takes Minority Stake in Gabriela Hearst." January 2019.
• Gabriela Hearst. "Gabriela Hearst and Adam Pendleton Release a Series of Limited-edition Nina Bags." April 2026.
• WWD. "Gabriela Hearst and Artist Adam Pendleton Have Released a Series of Limited-edition Nina Bags." April 2026.
• Richemont. "Chloé announces the appointment of Gabriela Hearst as Creative Director." 7 December 2020.
• Fashionista. "Gabriela Hearst Named Creative Director of Chloé." December 2020.
• Vogue Scandinavia. "Chloé becomes first luxury fashion house to receive B Corp certification." 2021.
• WWD. "Chloé Attains B Corp Certification." 18 October 2021.
• CNN. "Jill Biden's inauguration 'gown' inspired by unity, designer says." 21 January 2021.
• Smithsonian Institution. "Smithsonian Adds First Lady Jill Biden's Inaugural Ensembles to Its Historic First Ladies Collection." 25 January 2023.
• Forbes. "Chloé Confirms Gabriela Hearst Will Exit After Her Next Runway Collection." 6 July 2023.
• Euronews. "Goodbye Chloé: Gabriela Hearst to step down as creative director." 7 July 2023.
• Refinery29. "CFDA Fashion Awards 2020 Winners Include Telfar & More." 14 September 2020.
• WWD. "Gabriela Hearst Wins Womenswear Designer of the Year at CFDA Fashion Awards." September 2020.
• WWD. "Museum at FIT Honors Gabriela Hearst with 2023 Couture Council Award for Artistry of Fashion." September 2023.
• Yahoo Entertainment. "Lily Gladstone's Met Gala Dress Features Nearly 500 Embroidered Silver Stars." May 2024.
• Gabriela Hearst. "Lily Gladstone Wears Custom Gabriela Hearst to the 2024 Met Gala." May 2024.
• WWD. "Gabriela Hearst Fall 2026 Ready-to-Wear Runway, Fashion Show & Collection Review." March 2026.
• Modaes Global. "Gabriela Hearst Elevates Michele Cohen to Brand President." 2025.
• WWD. "Gabriela Hearst to Design Uniforms for the Uruguayan National Football Team for World Cup 2026." June 2026.
• Gabriela Hearst. "Sustainable Practices Timeline."