The son of a carpenter will soon be becoming the new chief executive officer (CEO) of Burberry. Christopher Bailey will be replacing Angela Ahrendts and will also continue his present role at Burberry as the chief creativeofficer. Christopher Bailey says that he is honored to be provided with the opportunity to take on the CEO role at Burberry and it means a lot to him. He was born in Halifax in the year 1971 with his father being a carpenter and mother being a visual merchandiser. He loved looking through jumble sales, from which he coincidentally bought his first Burberry coat. Christopher became interested in taking on fashion as a career because his art teacher encouraged him to designing trendy clothing. Due to the motivation of his art teacher, Bailey got an admission at the University of Westminster to study for a Bachelor’s degree in fashion designing. He graduated from the University in 1990. He was named as the student of the year at the Graduate Fashion Week and he also won a scholarship to take on a Master’s degree at the Royal College of Art. After doing some work with Donna Karan, Christopher Bailey came to Milan to work as the senior designer of women’s wear at Gucci which was under the creative directorship of Tom Ford. He worked at Gucci till 2001, when Rose Marie Bravo, the CEO of Burberry at that time, called him back to the UK.
In the year 2009, Bailey was made the chief creative officer of the fashion company Burberry, which is a role that he will maintain when he becomes the CEO of Burberry in mid-2014. Since becoming a part of Burberry, Bailey has obtained three honorary doctorates which includes one from the University of Westminster, where he went for his BA in the year 2004, one from Sheffield Hallam University in the year 2011, and one from the Royal College of Art in the year 2013. He has also been crowned as the Designer of the Year two times at the British Fashion Awards. With respect to his past achievements, we can see that Christopher Bailey is definitely a great candidate for the new CEO of Burberry!
