The basics
An American fashion house based in New York, Marc Jacobs has been owned since September 2026 by a partnership of WHP Global and G-III Apparel Group. The company sells ready-to-wear, bags, leather goods, shoes, jewelry, eyewear and fragrance, with handbags marc jacob as its core. The house shows roughly once a year, in early February, outside the official New York Fashion Week calendar. The label opened its first store in SoHo in 1997, and its flagship today is at 127–129 Prince Street in Manhattan. The ground this marc jacobs overview covers is the designer, the labels, the corporate structure and the range as they stood in late September 2026. Readers who arrive from the singular search phrase "marc jacob overview” should note the correct spelling carries a plural, Jacobs.
- Founder and Creative Director: Marc Jacobs, born in New York City in 1963
- Founding year: 1984, according to the brand’s own timeline
- Headquarters: the company sits in New York City
- Owners since 1 September 2026: the partnership of WHP Global and G-III Apparel Group
- Chief Executive: Eric Marechalle, in the role since 2017
- Current labels: Marc Jacobs, The Marc Jacobs, Heaven by Marc Jacobs
The name on the label
Marc Jacobs was born in New York City in 1963 and trained at Parsons School of Design, graduating in 1984. The youngest ever winner of the CFDA’s Perry Ellis Award for New Fashion Talent, he took the prize while still a student. He went to Perry Ellis in 1988 and in November 1992 showed the grunge-inflected spring 1993 collection that made his name and cost him the job. His own timeline dates the "Original Grunge Collection” to 1993 and lists a redux in 2018. Louis Vuitton named him its first creative director in 1997, and there he created its first ready-to-wear and ran artist collaborations with Takashi Murakami, Stephen Sprouse, Richard Prince and Yayoi Kusama. Nicolas Ghesquière took over after he showed his last Louis Vuitton collection in October 2013, and he remains Founder and Creative Director of his own company.
The lines under one name
Of the four names that matter in the history of the Marc Jacobs brand, three are still in use. The main line uses the plain name and holds the runway collections and the priciest products. Underneath it sat a diffusion line, Marc by Marc Jacobs, for fourteen years. Above the price floor is The Marc Jacobs, created to occupy that space. Apart from them stands Heaven by Marc Jacobs, with its own art direction and price band. Alongside the labels the company runs extensions that are not fashion labels: Bookmarc, Marc Jacobs Beauty and the Bark Jacobs dog line.
Marc Jacobs
The runway business is the main line, and every other label grew out of it. Its bag categories are The Tote Bag, The Snapshot and The Scene, plus groupings for crossbody, mini, shoulder bags and totes. The largest family is The Tote Bag, launched in 2019 and reinvented each season. The Snapshot takes a camera-bag shape the brand says was conceived in a Parisian studio with its design team. The Sack Bag turned up first on the 2022 runway, and The Scene now has its own place in the site navigation. Cast as a rejection of exclusivity rather than a pursuit of it, the line "No more Birkins, only Tote Bags,” is attributed by the company to Jacobs.
Marc by Marc Jacobs
Marc by Marc Jacobs started in 2001 as the diffusion line, aimed at a younger, cheaper end of the market. Across fourteen years it was how many shoppers first came across the designer. The line came to an end in 2015, after the fall and winter collection, and went back into the main line. A distinct price tier was removed from the business by that move rather than simply renamed. The one place the label now exists is on resale pieces from that period, where buyers still find it. Knowing the name matters, because it is routinely confused with the sub-label that replaced it.
The Marc Jacobs
The Marc Jacobs was announced in December 2018 and launched for pre-fall 2019, about four years after the diffusion line closed. Functionally descended from Marc by Marc Jacobs, it is a lower-priced sub-label built to reoccupy the tier the company had vacated. Home to the canvas totes and much of the everyday accessory range, it is in practice the line most casual buyers meet. The online tag on those products is still "THE collection,” the quickest way to identify one. The definite article is deliberate and capitalized, so it is written The Marc Jacobs. Mix it up with the main line and you get much of the price confusion around the label.
Heaven by Marc Jacobs
Started in September 2020 under art director Ava Nirui, Heaven by Marc Jacobs was built around youth subculture and a gender-fluid, do-it-yourself sensibility. In the company’s own words it is a gateway into what it terms the omniverse of Marc Jacobs subversion, and Jacobs is quoted saying that "Heaven is a world within our Marc Jacobs world”. Prices sit well under the main line, with bags around $150 to $250 and tees from about $65 on the US site in September 2026. The range covered roughly 153 products, and it runs standalone stores in Los Angeles, New York and London. You see artist collaborations in the product names, among them a David Rappeneau shoulder bag listed at about $175. News of Nirui’s departure came in January 2026 with no successor named, so the label’s current creative leadership is not confirmed by the brand.
Ownership and the people in charge
The question of who owns Marc Jacobs had one answer for nearly thirty years before it changed in 2026. The LVMH majority stake dates to 1997, the year Jacobs took up the Louis Vuitton role, and the exact percentage was never published. LVMH set out a definitive agreement to sell the brand to WHP Global and G-III Apparel Group on 14 May 2026; the deal closed on 1 September 2026. Two parts make up the structure: a fifty-fifty joint venture owns the intellectual property with WHP Global leading licensing, while G-III operates the wholesale, retail and e-commerce business under a long-term license from that venture. A figure of roughly $925 million came from Business of Fashion and WWD, but LVMH disclosed no value, so it is press-reported rather than official. Marc Jacobs stays on as Founder and Creative Director, with the closing announcement committing to continuity of the creative vision, collections and shows; Eric Marechalle has been chief executive since 2017.
| The year | What happened |
|---|---|
| 1963 | Marc Jacobs comes into the world in New York City |
| 1984 | Graduates Parsons; brand timeline dates the founding here |
| 1988 | Takes a job at Perry Ellis |
| 1992 to 1993 | Grunge collection, then the parting with Perry Ellis |
| 1997 | Louis Vuitton role begins; LVMH takes a majority stake; SoHo store opens |
| 2001 | Marc by Marc Jacobs comes to market |
| 2007 | Daisy fragrance arrives |
| 2010 | Bookmarc sets up on Bleecker Street |
| 2013 | The closing Louis Vuitton collection, shown in October |
| 2014 | Debut of Marc Jacobs Beauty |
| 2015 | End of Marc by Marc Jacobs |
| 2019 | The Marc Jacobs and The Tote Bag both launch; watches end after November |
| 2020 | Heaven by Marc Jacobs goes live in September |
| 2026 | The purchase from LVMH by WHP Global and G-III completes on 1 September |
The show schedule
The company does not follow the four-season calendar most houses of its size still use. It shows once a year, in early February, a few days before New York Fashion Week opens and deliberately off schedule. The collections are seasonless and named for the year, which is why they are called runway collections rather than spring or fall lines. Recent dates were 2 February 2024 at the Park Avenue Armory, 3 February 2025 at the New York Public Library, and February 2026 at the Armory again. Coverage in the trade press of the 2026 show, titled "Memory. Loss.”, read it as a turn toward wearability. No confirmation exists on whether it also showed during September 2026 fashion week, and on the established pattern the next outing falls in February 2027.
What the brand sells today
Handbags sit at the commercial core, with 312 products in the full bag listing on the US site in September 2026, across canvas, jacquard, leather, denim and seasonal fabrics. Canvas totes start at about $150 and leather totes reach about $598, while The Dakota Tote sits at roughly $798, all figures that vary by country and change without notice. Ready-to-wear, shoes, wallets, jewelry, eyewear and children’s products sit beyond bags, plus a permanent discount section called MARCDOWN. Fragrance began with Daisy in 2007, named after Daisy Buchanan from The Great Gatsby. Marc Jacobs Beauty dates to 2014 and now operates under Coty, which relaunched the line in 2026, while watches were discontinued after November 2019 and carry no valid warranty. On the ground the estate leans toward discount, since the store locator listed 103 locations in September 2026, of which 46 were boutiques and 57 outlets, with Regent Street in London the only boutique in Europe.
