Amy Smilovic isn’t sure she considers herself a designer. As the creative director and founder of Tibi, the contemporary brand she launched 20 years ago in Hong Kong, she is responsible for a ready-to-wear and accessories business with $50 million in revenues. But she has no formal design training. Her previous professional life was in advertising, working at Ogilvy & Mather and American Express in account management, not creative.
“For sure, I always have imposter syndrome,” Smilovic said in her downtown Manhattan office one spring afternoon. “Nothing is more painful to me than walking out at the end of the runway show and waving. I have very firm ideas on what I love and how proportions go together and how things should fit, but I can’t drape a dress.”
What she lacks in technical skill she’s made up for with sharp instincts, a good eye and unconventional business practices that have made Tibi a unique case study in contemporary American fashion. In the two decades since Smilovic decided to launch a clothing line, as an expat who moved to Hong Kong for her husband Frank Smilovic’s job, the brand has had two lives — first, undeniably young and print-driven contemporary 1.0; the second, sophisticated
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