Matthew Williams

Matthew M. Williams is an American designer, creative, and entrepreneur. The co-founder of the fashion brand 1017 ALYX 9SM, he was appointed creative director of Givenchy women's and men's collections in June 2020. Early life Williams was born on October 17, 1985, in Evanston, Illinois. His parents worked in the medical field. When he was two years old, the family moved to Pismo Beach, California, where he grew up. As a child, he wanted to become an emergency room doctor. As a teen, he became interested in skateboard culture soccer and music, and would drive to Santa Barbara and Los Angeles to attend concerts and DJ sets. At 18, during an internship with a soccer coach who also owned a clothing brand, Williams realized that fashion could be a career. Williams took one semester of art classes at the University of California but never pursued any formal fashion training. Career Art direction Despite being rejected from Parsons School of Design, Williams landed a job as a production manager and began to learn the business of running a clothing label before discovering costume design through music stylists.