Made Good Designs

Thirty-three brand guides to everyday apparel and the stores that sell it.

Everyday apparel brands live on hang tags, shopping bags and mall storefronts. These guides cover basics, kidswear, shoe stores and apparel retailers, with ownership changes and closures stated plainly.

How to use these guides

Each guide covers who owns the name today, where the products are made — by the maker’s own account and, where it differs, by other sources — and the brand’s visual identity. A company’s description of itself is attributed to the company, and where a business has closed we say so plainly. The table at the end gathers the essentials.

Underwear and basics

Hanes, Fruit of the Loom, Jockey, BVD, Maidenform and Vanity Fair Lingerie.

  • Hanes — Two knitting firms started by the brothers John Wesley and Pleasant H. Hanes in Winston-Salem, North Carolina, around 1900–1901, a Hanes Underwear label from 1913, the Hanes Corporation merger of 1965, Sara Lee from 1979, HanesBrands from 2006 and Gildan ownership since 1 December 2025.
  • Fruit of the Loom — A name adopted in 1856 by B.B. & R. Knight of Rhode Island, a fruit label the company traces to a merchant’s daughter, a trademark registered in 1871, a cluster revised in 1875 and 1883, Bowling Green, Kentucky, and Berkshire Hathaway ownership since 2002.
  • Jockey — The underwear brand of Jockey International, Kenosha, Wisconsin, which began in 1876 as Samuel T. Cooper’s Michigan hosiery business, took the Jockey name in 1929, launched the Y-front brief at Marshall Field’s in 1935 and became Jockey International in 1972.
  • BVD — The underwear initialism named for Bradley, Voorhees and Day of New York, founded in 1876, owned through Union Underwear, later Fruit of the Loom, since 1976, and sold in Japan as B.V.D. by Fujibo Apparel under a licence signed in April 1976.
  • Maidenform — The bra brand that grew out of Enid Bissett’s New York dress shop in 1922, named against the “Boyish Form” look, advertised for two decades from 1949 with the “I Dreamed” campaign, bought by Hanesbrands in 2013 and part of Gildan since 1 December 2025.
  • Vanity Fair Lingerie — The lingerie name of a company founded in Reading, Pennsylvania, in 1899 as the Reading Glove and Mitten Manufacturing Company, which moved its sewing to Alabama from 1937, became VF Corporation in 1969 and sold the brand to Fruit of the Loom in 2007.

Children’s clothing

Carter’s, Gymboree, The Children’s Place, Janie and Jack, Hanna Andersson and Garanimals.

  • Carter’s — The children’s clothing name William Carter began in Needham, Massachusetts, around a mill built in 1865, sold by the Carter family in 1990, now based in Atlanta and owner of OshKosh B’gosh since 2005 and Skip Hop since 2017.
  • Gymboree — The name Joan Barnes gave to parent-and-baby play classes in 1976, used for children’s clothing stores from 1986, owned by Bain Capital from 2010, and a brand The Children’s Place has owned since 2019, relaunched online and in shop-in-shops in 2020.
  • The Children’s Place — The children’s clothing chain opened in Hartford, Connecticut, in 1969 by David Pulver and Clinton Clark, sold to Federated Department Stores, bought out in 1988, listed on Nasdaq in 1997, owner of the Gymboree name since 2019 and majority-owned by Mithaq Capital since 2024.
  • Janie and Jack — The San Francisco children’s clothing brand introduced by Gymboree in September 2002, bought by Gap Inc. at Gymboree’s 2019 auction, owned by Go Global Retail since 2021 and opened in London with the maternity label Hatch in 2025.
  • Hanna Andersson — The Portland, Oregon children’s clothing company set up in 1983 by Gun and Tom Denhart, named for Gun’s Swedish grandmother, built on a hand-made mail-order catalogue, owned by Kellwood from 2007 and Sun Capital from 2008, and by L Catterton since 2016.
  • Garanimals — The children’s clothing label Garan Incorporated introduced in 1972, built on animal hang-tags that let children match tops and bottoms, credited to Seymour Lichtenstein, owned with Garan by Berkshire Hathaway since 2002, sold through Walmart since 2008 and now also online at Amazon.

Shoes and shoe stores

Keds, Sperry, Hush Puppies, SAS, Payless, Famous Footwear and DSW.

  • Keds — The canvas-shoe brand created by U.S. Rubber in 1916 around the Champion, sold to Stride Rite in 1979, owned by Wolverine World Wide from 2012 and by Designer Brands since February 2023, with campaigns from “How Do You Do?” to “Ladies First.”
  • Sperry — The boat-shoe brand Paul Sperry started in 1935 with the Top-Sider, sold to U.S. Rubber in 1940, owned by Stride Rite from 1979 and Wolverine World Wide from 2012, renamed plain Sperry in 2015 and owned by Authentic Brands Group since January 2024.
  • Hush Puppies — The casual shoe Wolverine of Rockford, Michigan, launched nationally in 1958 from brushed pigskin suede, named after the fried cornbread said to quiet barking dogs, marked with a basset hound, revived by New York designers in the mid-1990s and still listed by Wolverine World Wide in 2026.
  • SAS — San Antonio Shoemakers, the Texas shoe company founded in 1976 by Terry Armstrong and Lew Hayden, who came from Maine by way of the Bimbi Shoe Co., opened general-store-themed shops from 1981, added a factory in Del Rio in 1985 and describes itself as family-owned.
  • Payless — The self-service shoe chain founded in Topeka, Kansas, in 1956 by cousins Louis and Shaol Pozez, renamed Payless ShoeSource with a yellow, orange and brown logo in 1978, owned by May Department Stores from 1979, relaunched online as Payless in 2020.
  • Famous Footwear — The branded-shoe chain that grew from Neil Moldenhauer’s 1960 outlet in Madison, Wisconsin, took its name at a Cedar Rapids store in 1964, has been owned since 1980 by Brown Group, now Caleres, and repainted its stores chocolate and cherry in 2003.
  • DSW — Designer Shoe Warehouse, the shoe chain that grew from Shonac Corporation and the Schottenstein family’s Value City business, opened in Dublin, Ohio, in 1991, went public in 2005 and since 2019 belongs to the renamed Designer Brands Inc. of Columbus.

Mall apparel retail

Frederick’s of Hollywood, Wet Seal, Gadzooks and Chess King.

  • Frederick’s of Hollywood — A lingerie business begun by Frederick Mellinger in a Fifth Avenue loft in 1946, moved to Los Angeles in 1947, known for a purple, pink and gray Art Deco store on Hollywood Boulevard, closed its stores in 2015 and owned by Authentic Brands Group since 2015.
  • Wet Seal — A teen apparel retailer that began as Lorne’s, a Newport Beach bikini shop opened by Lorne Huycke in 1962, took its name from a remark at a fashion show, bought Contempo Casuals in 1995, launched Arden B. in 1998 and was sold to Gordon Brothers in 2017.
  • Gadzooks — The teen mall chain Jerry Szczepanski and Larry Titus opened at Town East Mall in Mesquite, Texas, in 1983, named for a sign with fewer letters, known for Volkswagen Beetle displays and neon, and sold to an affiliate of Forever 21 in 2005.
  • Chess King — The young men’s mall chain the Melville Corporation opened at the Dedham Mall in Massachusetts in March 1968, described in 1970 for its bold colouring and designs, sold to Merry-Go-Round Enterprises in 1993 and closed in November 1995.

Apparel retailers

Old Navy, Banana Republic, Forever 21, H&M and Primark.

  • Old Navy — The Gap Inc. chain that grew out of the Gap Warehouse outlets of 1993, renamed in March 1994 after a name Mickey Drexler saw in Paris, built around warehouse-style stores, Magic the dog and a cast of retro television stars.
  • Banana Republic — The Banana Republic Travel and Safari Clothing Company started in Marin County in 1978 by Mel and Patricia Ziegler with army-surplus clothes and a hand-illustrated catalogue, owned by Gap Inc. since 1983 and later remade as a city clothing brand.
  • Forever 21 — The Los Angeles clothing chain opened as Fashion 21 on Figueroa Street in 1984 by Do Won Chang and Jin Sook Chang, known for its yellow shopping bags, bought out of bankruptcy in 2020 by Authentic Brands Group with two mall owners, and without US stores since 2025.
  • H&M — The Swedish retailer Erling Persson opened as Hennes, a women’s-wear shop in Västerås, in 1947, renamed Hennes & Mauritz after buying the Stockholm hunting and menswear retailer Mauritz Widforss in 1968, and known since 2004 for its guest-designer collections.
  • Primark — The Dublin retailer Arthur Ryan opened as Penneys on Mary Street in 1969 for the Weston family, renamed Primark outside the Republic of Ireland after a dispute with JC Penney, owned by Associated British Foods, and given a refreshed wordmark and “portal” device by VCCP in 2024.

Mall apparel and lingerie

Express, Abercrombie & Fitch, Hollister Co., Aéropostale and Victoria’s Secret.

  • Express — The fashion chain that opened in 1980 as Limited Express at Water Tower Place in Chicago, dropped “Limited” from its name in 1982, left Limited Brands from 2007, filed for Chapter 11 in 2024 and has been owned since 2024 by Phoenix, a joint venture led by WHP Global.
  • Abercrombie & Fitch — The New York outfitter founded by David T. Abercrombie and joined by Ezra Fitch, bought by Oshman’s in 1978 and The Limited in 1988, spun off in 1996, and from 2014 stripped of the moose logo it had worn across North America.
  • Hollister Co. — The Abercrombie & Fitch brand opened at Easton Town Center in Columbus, Ohio, in July 2000, given a 1922 founding story and a fictional John Hollister, and sold for years through mall stores built to look like beach shacks.
  • Aéropostale — The mall apparel brand Wikipedia says R. H. Macy & Co. opened in 1987, named after the French word for airmail, taken through Chapter 11 in 2016 by a consortium including Authentic Brands Group and mall owners, and part of Catalyst Brands since 2025.
  • Victoria’s Secret — The lingerie brand Roy and Gaye Raymond founded in California in 1977, named for Queen Victoria, bought by Les Wexner’s Limited in 1982, known for its catalog, Angels and runway show, and an independent company since its 2021 spin-off.

At a glance: founding, owner and base

Taken from each guide’s fact panel, as of October 2026. Ownership changes; follow the link for sources and detail.

BrandFoundedOwnerBase
Abercrombie & FitchNew York City (1892 (Wikipedia; Ohio State gives 1898))Abercrombie & Fitch Co., New Albany, OhioToday: Abercrombie & Fitch Co., New Albany, Ohio
AéropostaleR. H. Macy & Co., Thousand Oaks, California, and Short Hills, New Jersey (1987)Catalyst Brands, formed in 2025Today: Catalyst Brands, formed in 2025
Banana RepublicBanana Republic Travel and Safari Clothing Company, Mill Valley, California (1978)A Gap Inc. brand, owned since 1983Today: A Gap Inc. brand, owned since 1983
BVDNew York City (1876)Fruit of the Loom (U.S.); Fujibo Apparel licence (Japan)Today: Fruit of the Loom (U.S.); Fujibo Apparel licence (Japan)
Carter’sWilliam Carter Company, Needham, Massachusetts (1865)Carter’s, Inc., headquartered in Atlanta, GeorgiaToday: Carter’s, Inc., headquartered in Atlanta, Georgia
Chess KingDedham Mall, Dedham, Massachusetts, by the Melville Corporation (1968)Owners: Melville Corporation; Merry-Go-Round Enterprises from 1993Closed: Chain closed by Merry-Go-Round Enterprises
DSWShonac Corporation; DSW chain from Dublin, Ohio (1969; 1991)Designer Brands Inc., Columbus, Ohio (renamed 2019)Today: Designer Brands Inc., Columbus, Ohio (renamed 2019)
ExpressWater Tower Place, Chicago (1980 (as Limited Express))Phoenix (WHP Global-led joint venture); Columbus, OhioToday: Phoenix (WHP Global-led joint venture); Columbus, Ohio
Famous FootwearNeil’s Factory Shoe Outlet, Madison, Wisconsin (1960)A division of Caleres, owner since 1980 (as Brown Group)Today: A division of Caleres, owner since 1980 (as Brown Group)
Forever 21As Fashion 21, Figueroa Street, Los Angeles (1984)A brand held by Authentic Brands Group; no US stores since 2025Today: A brand held by Authentic Brands Group; no US stores since 2025
Frederick’s of HollywoodA loft on Fifth Avenue, New York City (1946)Brand owned by Authentic Brands Group since 2015; sold onlineToday: Brand owned by Authentic Brands Group since 2015; sold online
Fruit of the LoomB.B. & R. Knight, Pontiac Mill, Warwick, Rhode Island (1851)Fruit of the Loom, Inc., headquartered in Bowling Green, Kentucky; a Berkshire Hathaway subsidiary since 2002Today: Fruit of the Loom, Inc., headquartered in Bowling Green, Kentucky; a Berkshire Hathaway subsidiary since 2002
GadzooksTown East Mall, Mesquite, Texas (1983)Assets bought by a Forever 21 affiliate in 2005; stores phased outToday: Assets bought by a Forever 21 affiliate in 2005; stores phased out
GaranimalsIntroduced: by Garan Incorporated, New York (1972)Garan, a Berkshire Hathaway subsidiaryOwner: Garan, a Berkshire Hathaway subsidiary
GymboreeParent-and-baby play classes started by Joan Barnes, California (1976)A brand of The Children’s Place, owned since 2019Today: A brand of The Children’s Place, owned since 2019
H&MHennes, a women’s-wear shop in Västerås, Sweden (1947)H & M Hennes & Mauritz AB, headquartered in StockholmToday: H & M Hennes & Mauritz AB, headquartered in Stockholm
HanesShamrock Knitting Mills and P. H. Hanes Knitting Company, Winston-Salem, North Carolina (1900–1901)A brand of Gildan Activewear, headquartered in Montreal, which completed its purchase of HanesBrands on 1 December 2025Today: A brand of Gildan Activewear, headquartered in Montreal, which completed its purchase of HanesBrands on 1 December 2025
Hanna AnderssonPortland, Oregon (1983)L CattertonOwner: L Catterton
Hollister Co.Easton Town Center, Columbus, Ohio (2000)Abercrombie & Fitch Co., headquartered in New Albany, OhioToday: Abercrombie & Fitch Co., headquartered in New Albany, Ohio
Hush PuppiesRockford, Michigan (1958 (national launch))A Wolverine World Wide brandToday: A Wolverine World Wide brand
Janie and JackIntroduced: The Gymboree Corporation, San Francisco (2002)Janie and Jack LLC, San Francisco; parent Matri Group, backed by Go Global RetailToday: Janie and Jack LLC, San Francisco; parent Matri Group, backed by Go Global Retail
JockeyS.T. Cooper and Sons, Michigan (1876)Jockey International, Inc., headquartered in Kenosha, WisconsinToday: Jockey International, Inc., headquartered in Kenosha, Wisconsin
KedsUnited States (U.S. Rubber) (1916)Designer Brands Inc.Owner: Designer Brands Inc.
MaidenformEnid Frocks dress shop, New York City (1922)A Hanesbrands brand; Hanesbrands has been part of Gildan since 1 December 2025Today: A Hanesbrands brand; Hanesbrands has been part of Gildan since 1 December 2025
Old NavyRenamed from Gap Warehouse, San Francisco Bay Area (1994)A Gap Inc. brand, with corporate operations in San FranciscoToday: A Gap Inc. brand, with corporate operations in San Francisco
PaylessPay-Less National, Topeka, Kansas (1956)Payless, relaunched online in August 2020Today: Payless, relaunched online in August 2020
PrimarkPenneys, Mary Street, Dublin (1969)Associated British FoodsToday: Primark Limited, headquartered in Dublin; trades as Penneys in the Republic of Ireland
SASSan Antonio, Texas (1976)Founders: Terry Armstrong, Lew HaydenFactories: San Antonio; Del Rio, Texas
SperryUnited States (1935)Authentic Brands GroupOwner: Authentic Brands Group
The Children’s PlaceDavid Pulver and Clinton Clark; store in Hartford, Connecticut (1969)The Children’s Place, Inc., Secaucus, New Jersey; majority shareholder Mithaq CapitalToday: The Children’s Place, Inc., Secaucus, New Jersey; majority shareholder Mithaq Capital
Vanity Fair LingerieReading Glove and Mitten Manufacturing Company, Reading, Pennsylvania (1899)Vanity Fair Brands, part of Fruit of the Loom (Berkshire Hathaway)Today: Vanity Fair Brands, part of Fruit of the Loom (Berkshire Hathaway)
Victoria’s SecretRoy and Gaye Raymond, Stanford Shopping Center, Palo Alto, California (1977)Victoria’s Secret & Co., independent since 2021Today: Victoria’s Secret & Co., independent since 2021
Wet SealNewport Beach, California, as Lorne’s (1962)Stores closed in 2017; name bought by Gordon Brothers in 2017Today: Stores closed in 2017; name bought by Gordon Brothers in 2017

See also all collections.