George Esquivel outlines plans for Tumi at Global Citizens event
A keen sense of style and a little get-up-and-go brought George Esquivel from a troubled childhood to the top of the fashion world, writes Abid Rahman
George Esquivel is a difficult interview. It's not that the noted shoe designer and creative director of luggage company Tumi is uncooperative - on the contrary, he's the epitome of southern California positivity and couldn't be further from the diva cliché of many in fashion.
Rather, Esquivel's life and career is so rich and veers from so many lows to dizzying highs that it's difficult to capture his story fully in the time we have together. "This could go on for hours," says Esquivel, looking over at a nervous press manager, "so you're going to have to be very specific".
Best to start with the present and work backwards. In his role as creative director of Tumi, Esquivel is making a flying visit to Hong Kong to be at the announcement of two new Tumi Global Citizens and the first from Asia - award-winning Chinese industrial designer Jamy Yang and Hong Kong-born television and radio personality Dominic Lau.
Really, the only thing I learned from my dad was hustling
Yang and Lau join the likes of Alexandra Cousteau, Amanda Sudano and Eric Whitacre as the official faces of the Global Citizen campaign, but Esquivel sees the concept as something much broader and encompassing a more diverse group of people.
"Global Citizens are people that travel the world for work and play; it's about a travel lifestyle," says Esquivel adding that his first choice for Global Citizen on joining the company was singer Sudano, daughter of Donna Summer.
"Take Amanda Sudano. I met her in Paris doing a show about 2½ years ago, and after the show they were going to India to work in an orphanage. Now this is not a girl who travels by private jet … she and her husband, they rough it, they stay on friends' couches when they play gigs, but yet she's glamorous, she models. She is someone who inspires people, and she is a true global citizen."
Essentially a shoe designer, Esquivel's rise to the role of creative director at Tumi, a New York Stock Exchange-listed corporation, is at odds with his unorthodox upbringing. But Esquivel laughs at the notion that he is the epitome of the American dream.