Matthew M. Williams

Matthew M. Williams founded 1017 ALYX 9SM in 2015, later bringing its industrial hardware to Givenchy as creative director from 2020 to 2023. He now divides his time between ALYX, a small namesake line and a role at Oakley, which he joined in March 2026. The rollercoaster buckle remains his clearest signature: a functional clasp turned into the centre of a fashion accessory. (Hypebeast; WWD)

Williams came to clothing through stage design, music and the making of objects. His first sustained fashion work was with Lady Gaga’s Haus of Gaga; at ALYX, the quick-release clasp from a rollercoaster restraint became a belt buckle, then appeared on bags and jewellery. He tends to begin with how a thing is made and fastened, letting the hardware give the garment its character. (Complex; Highsnobiety)

From Illinois to Lady Gaga's Haus of Gaga

Williams grew up in Illinois and came to fashion without a design-school degree. His early work was practical and improvisational, made for performers rather than a conventional runway. (Complex)

His entry into fashion came through music and performance rather than a studio. In 2008 he began designing costumes and stage props for Lady Gaga, including the "Disco Stick" prop, and became the first artistic director of her creative collective, the Haus of Gaga, a role that ran into 2009 when Gaga hired him full-time for her first world tour and continued through the Monster Ball Tour before he left around the end of 2010. Gaga's fanbase nicknamed him "Dada." (Gagapedia; Complex)

In 2012 Williams co-founded Been Trill, an art and DJing collective, with Heron Preston, Virgil Abloh and Justin Saunders. The group's graphic output and club nights fed directly into the late-2000s and early-2010s convergence of streetwear, DJ culture and high fashion from which several of its members, including Williams, later built independent labels. (WWD)

Founding ALYX and the rollercoaster buckle

Williams founded his own label in 2015 with his then-wife Jennifer Murray, who managed global sales until 2019, and Luca Benini of the multi-brand retailer Slam Jam. The three named it after Williams and Murray's eldest daughter, and it debuted with a Fall/Winter 2015 womenswear collection. In 2016 the label was a finalist for the LVMH Prize, and menswear followed in 2017. (Grailed; WWD)

The label's defining object came from a family trip to Six Flags Magic Mountain in California, where Williams noticed the quick-release clasp on a rollercoaster harness. He contacted the harness manufacturer directly and asked for a lighter version to use on a belt, drawn to what he described as its sculptural, purely functional shape. The resulting rollercoaster buckle first appeared on the label's belts and became its calling card — it was even the brand's first Instagram post — before spreading across bags, jewellery and clothing closures. (nss magazine; Interview)

The brand's name changed more than once. It launched simply as Alyx, then in May 2018, ahead of showing its Spring/Summer 2019 collection at Paris Fashion Week, it renamed itself 1017 ALYX 9SM. The numbers were not decorative: 1017 is Williams's birthday, and 9SM abbreviates the address of the label's first studio on Saint Mark's Place in New York. The rebrand followed a trademark setback — in 2015 Clinique had blocked the "Alyx" mark from registering in the EU's cosmetics class, arguing it was too close to its own "Calyx" fragrance, and the new "1017 ALYX 9SM" filing was drafted to cover cosmetics and fragrance categories the original name could not. (Hypebeast; The Fashion Law)

Two industrial collaborations extended the buckle's reach in the same period. MMW x Nike, a running-shoe partnership that began in 2019 and continued into the Zoom MMW 4 released in December 2020, applied Williams's hardware-first vocabulary to midsoles and overlays — chrome eyelets, exposed foam and visible Zoom Air units standing in for the buckle's mechanical logic. Moncler invited him into its Moncler Genius collaborative platform, where the 6 Moncler 1017 ALYX 9SM line ran across multiple seasons from 2019 into 2020, applying rollercoaster hardware, chain belts and ultrasonic-welded panels to down outerwear. (Hypebae; W Magazine)

Underpinning all of this was a move Williams made in 2017, relocating to Ferrara, Italy, to work more directly with the factories that produce his collections, close to Benini and to a dense cluster of small hardware and leather manufacturers. He has described his method as designing into the strength of a specific factory rather than sketching a garment and searching for someone to make it: "I'm a product person, I care about the materials, the manufacturers. It's difficult to make the product anywhere outside of Italy." (SSENSE)

Givenchy: a padlock on the house codes

LVMH announced Williams's appointment as Givenchy's creative director on 16 June 2020, succeeding Clare Waight Keller and taking charge of both womenswear and menswear. He presented his debut collection, a Spring/Summer 2021 look book shot by Heji Shin rather than a live show because of pandemic restrictions, in October 2020. (Refinery29; FashionNetwork)

At Givenchy he carried over the hardware-first method he had built at ALYX rather than abandoning it for the house's existing codes. His most visible object was a padlock closure, inspired by the love locks fixed to Paris's bridges, applied across bag hardware and jewellery in the same way the rollercoaster buckle had defined ALYX. He also reworked Hubert de Givenchy's own emblem, the interlocking-G "4G" and the Givenchy key, into lock-shaped fastenings and decorative hardware on leather goods. Two products from this approach, the Voyou bag and the Shark Lock boot, became the tenure's clearest commercial successes. (Highsnobiety; WWD)

Reviews of Williams’s Givenchy collections were mixed, especially early in a tenure disrupted by the pandemic. The Voyou bag and Shark Lock boots later gave the house more distinctive products, but analysts questioned whether its wider business had regained momentum by the time he left in 2023. (WWD; Fashionista)

Back to ALYX, a namesake label, and Oakley

Within days of the Givenchy announcement, Hong Kong entrepreneur Adrian Cheng took a majority personal stake in 1017 ALYX 9SM, with plans to expand direct-to-consumer distribution, open standalone stores and shift more of the business toward Paris. Williams remained the label's creative director throughout the change of ownership, and 2025 marked the brand's tenth anniversary. (WWD; Fucking Young!)

In June 2025 Williams also launched a small, self-financed label under his own name, showing during Paris Fashion Week Men's at the Seiya Nakamura showroom. He described it as "more of a clothing project" than a fashion collection — Japanese denim, American jersey and Spanish handmade footwear built around long-standing supplier relationships rather than a seasonal theme, and deliberately distinct from both ALYX's streetwear register and Givenchy's dark opulence. (WWD; Hypebeast)

On 26 March 2026, EssilorLuxottica named Williams creative director of apparel, footwear and accessories at Oakley, working alongside Travis Scott, the brand's Chief Visionary Officer. Williams, who grew up in California, said Oakley "was part of my upbringing" and that its technical, engineering-led design language matched his own. As of September 2026 he holds this post concurrently with his ALYX creative directorship and his namesake label. (Oakley; Hypebeast)

Labels, dating and how to read the work

The label began as ALYX and became 1017 ALYX 9SM ahead of the Spring/Summer 2019 collection. An early garment may therefore carry the shorter mark, while later pieces use the full name. For a precise date, look for the collection code on the care label rather than relying on the year it appeared in a resale listing.

Givenchy pieces from Williams's tenure fall between his first Spring/Summer 2021 look book, released in October 2020, and the pre-fall 2024 collections that shipped after his December 2023 departure announcement — a garment's retail-delivery date does not necessarily match the season in which Williams designed it, since pre-fall and resort deliveries typically land months after a collection's presentation. Hardware is the fastest way to place a Givenchy piece within his era: the padlock closure and reworked 4G motif are specific to his design language and do not appear on collections before June 2020 or on collections developed by the in-house studio after his exit. Collaboration pieces — the MMW x Nike running shoes and the 6 Moncler 1017 ALYX 9SM outerwear — carry their own co-branded labelling separate from ALYX's mainline codes and should be read as time-boxed capsule releases rather than as part of either house's ongoing line.

References

• Hypebeast. "Matthew M. Williams Appointed Creative Director of Oakley." 26 March 2026.
• WWD. "EXCLUSIVE: Oakley Names Matthew M. Williams Its Creative Director of Apparel, Footwear and Accessories." 26 March 2026.
• Oakley. "Matthew M. Williams Named Creative Director, Apparel, Footwear and Accessories at Oakley as Travis Scott Continues the Brand's 'Chief Visionary Officer' Journey." 26 March 2026.
• Mike DeStefano. "How Matthew M. Williams Ascended to Givenchy." Complex.
• Gagapedia. "Matthew Williams."
• WWD. "Matthew Williams Pours Craftsmanship, Emotion Into 1017 Alyx 9SM."
• Grailed. "The History and Influence of Matthew Williams' Alyx Studios."
• nss magazine. "How the Iconic 1017 Alyx 9SM Buckle Came About."
• Interview. "ALYX Designer Matthew Williams Pairs Luxury Leather with Six Flags."
• Hypebeast. "ALYX Changes Name to 1017 ALYX 9SM." May 2018.
• The Fashion Law. "Alyx Becomes 1017 ALYX 9SM and Sheds Light on the Dynamics of the Fashion Rebrand."
• Hypebae. "Matthew Williams Reveals Release Date for Nike Zoom MMW 4 Collaboration." December 2020.
• W Magazine. "Moncler's Signature Puffers Get the 1017 ALYX 9SM Treatment."
• SSENSE. "Matthew Williams And The Business of Family."
• Refinery29. "Givenchy Taps Matthew Williams To Replace Clare Waight Keller As Creative Director." June 2020.
• FashionNetwork. "Givenchy Evokes Dark Futurism in First Show From Matthew Williams." October 2020.
• Highsnobiety. "Givenchy 7.0, a User's Manual from Matthew M. Williams."
• WWD. "Designer Matthew M. Williams Is Stepping Down at Givenchy." 1 December 2023.
• Fashionista. "Matthew Williams Is Leaving Givenchy." December 2023.
• WWD. "EXCLUSIVE: 1017 Alyx 9SM Secures Investment From Adrian Cheng." November 2023.
• Fucking Young!. "Matthew M. Williams & Adrian Cheng Reveal Bold Vision For 1017-ALYX-9SM."
• WWD. "Designer Matthew M. Williams Discusses His New Namesake Fashion Label." June 2025.
• Hypebeast. "Matthew M. Williams To Debut New Namesake Clothing Brand." June 2025.