Chicago has birthed a remarkable number of talented individuals who’ve made immense contributions to the fashion world, crafting beautiful and comfortable clothing for both everyday wear and special occasions. Their talent has propelled many onto the global stage, leading them to design for celebrities, actors, and stylish Chicagoans alike. We’ll dive into the details of Chicago’s designers and their creations right here on chicagoka.com.
Barbara Bates
Barbara Bates, a self-taught designer born and raised in Chicago, is renowned for her distinctive designs featuring exotic fabrics and leather accents. She has dressed a star-studded client list, including Michael Jordan, Whitney Houston, and Mike Tyson, among others. While working as a secretary at the First National Bank of Chicago in 1984, Bates began creating and selling her own designs. By 1986, she had already opened a 700-square-foot showroom in the South Loop, showcasing her unique apparel.
Barbara Bates is also the founder of the Bates Foundation, which provides custom-made prom dresses free of charge to underprivileged young women from inner-city Chicago schools.
Chelsea Billingsley
Chelsea Billingsley is the visionary behind House of Chelsea B, a brand that brilliantly fuses streetwear with textile art, particularly crochet. An Englewood native, Billingsley is a graduate of the Savannah College of Art and Design. Throughout her design career, she has actively collaborated with major brands like Nike and Jordan, and has even created outfits for rapper Baby Tate and for the reality show RuPaul’s Drag Race.
Christina Monley
Christina Monley’s creations are a huge hit with Chicagoans. She launched her women’s clothing brand, Christina Karin, in 2012. Described as “Midwestern ease meets global avant-garde,” Monley opened her first brick-and-mortar store in Bucktown in 2019. Her collections also include high-quality accessories.
Emmanuel Cabrera
Emmanuel Cabrera, the designer behind the brand Gente Fina—Spanish for “fine people”—seamlessly blends traditional Mexican art with contemporary design in his collections. This self-taught designer from Melrose Park founded the brand in 2018, making his New York Fashion Week debut that very February. His designs have captivated musicians and athletes, including Bulls guard and Chicago native Ayo Dosunmu, NFL player Rashod Bateman, and Mexican musician Karen Leon.
Alex McDermott
Alex McDermott established Am Studios immediately after graduating from the School of the Art Institute in 2022. Specializing in high fashion, she crafts true works of art, with her designs drawing inspiration from science fiction, the natural world, and classic tailoring.
Justin Dugan-LeBlanc
Justin Dugan-LeBlanc is a professor at Columbia College, where he teaches fashion design and installations. His expertise spans fashion, textile art, architecture, and technology. He was also one of the four finalists on the 12th season of Project Runway, which aired in 2013.
Maria Pinto
Maria Pinto is a celebrated Chicago designer who has dressed notable figures like Michelle Obama and Oprah Winfrey. Pinto honed her skills at the School of the Art Institute of Chicago and later interned in New York with women’s wear designer Geoffrey Beene. In 1991, she returned to Chicago and launched her own line of embroidered and beaded scarves. Her creations quickly gained popularity and were sold in prestigious stores like Bergdorf Goodman and Barneys. Pinto’s eponymous boutique is located in River North at 710 N. Wabash Ave.
Sheila Rashid
Chicago designer Sheila Rashid’s unisex clothing collections have earned high praise from Lena Waithe, Bella Hadid, and others. Her custom-made pieces, such as denim jumpsuits and puffer jackets, effortlessly blend masculine and feminine qualities. Each of her outfits is unique, possessing an undeniable charm and distinctiveness.
Tirrell Rello
Rello isn’t one to let his creativity go to waste. In 2014, along with his close friends Joe Robinson and Victor Peter, he opened Fat Tiger Workshop in Chicago. This multifaceted designer also manages his own streetwear brand, Vita Worldwide, and Paradise Design House, a project more focused on his aspirations as a contemporary artist. Before these ventures soared, Rello started his journey working at Leaders 1354, a Chicago streetwear boutique. Significantly, this store was a pioneer in showcasing an independent perspective on fashion and clothing. After several years there, he grasped how to transform art into design.
Soon after, he began creating outfits that skillfully combined various designs, catching the eye of well-known personalities. By offering stylish clothing, Rello quickly became a recognized and popular fashion designer.
Christopher Kites
Christopher Kites is considered a leading designer of clothing and jewelry. His collaboration with J Balvin on a glow-in-the-dark jewelry collection for ComplexCon Long Beach catapulted him to unprecedented fame. Kites soon visited Paris Fashion Week, after which he debuted a jewelry collection featuring superhero figures and toys encased in clear cubes, attached to plastic Cuban-link chains. In the summer of 2018, Vogue magazine published an article about the talented designer. From that moment, his career skyrocketed, and his creations are now cherished and respected not only by Chicagoans but by a global audience.
Andrea Newberry
Andrea Newberry is a talented fashion designer and the owner of the brand Leche Libre. The idea to launch her own label came to her after the birth of her two children. Andrea realized that society often pushes the notion that becoming a mother means sacrificing independence and a fulfilling urban life. But Newberry refused to conform to this stereotype and set out to prove it wrong. In 2014, she officially launched Leche Libre, a brand dedicated to creating clothing for nursing mothers. What makes her clothing unique is that it’s often made from discarded materials sourced from various Chicago warehouses. Notably, all products are manufactured in her own sewing factory in Pilsen.
Her series of comfortable, camouflage-style knit sweatshirt dresses has gained particular popularity. Newberry loves to incorporate rivets and tactical prints. In 2015, the designer introduced a motorcycle-style nursing hoodie.
Daniel Bernardo
At just 17, Daniel Bernardo taught himself to sew, initially creating unassuming outfits and repurposing existing clothes. Soon after, he launched a popular brand offering fitted, eco-friendly shirts with a vintage aesthetic. Bernardo produces his clothing in Chicago, using hemp fibers, recycled polyester, and organic cotton. Thanks to his talent, the designer releases unique collections that resonate not only with Chicagoans but also with people from various cities across the U.S. and other countries.
Jamie Hayes
Jamie Hayes is a renowned fashion designer in Chicago. For a long time, she worked in labor rights advocacy within the apparel industry in Peru. In the winter of 2015, she founded the brand Production Mode with the goal of changing the industry from within while creating incredible pieces. Her designs are characterized by their strict structure, yet they maintain a distinct femininity.