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Within the denim business, Kingpins founder Andrew Olah is something of an industry celebrity. His origin story began in the 1970s, as he joined and then took over his family’s textile agency business in Canada, following in his father’s footsteps. A few years after relocating the company to New York in 1998, he launched Kingpins as a party to meet more customers, and by 2008 it had blossomed into a commercial event. The rest is history, and today Kingpins spans shows in New York, Amsterdam, China and Hong Kong.
After passing the CEO torch at Kingpins to Vivian Wang earlier this year, Andrew has entered a new era of his career. As he explained to Lenzing’s Tuncay Kilickan in the latest episode of our Blue Cast podcast, his goal is to put commercial pursuits aside and focus on nonprofit work. Two of these nonprofit endeavors are Transformers Foundation—founded in 2020—and the Ethical Denim Council—launched in 2022.
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Read more on Carved in Blue.
This article is one of a series on SJ Denim from Lenzing’s Carved in Blue denim blog. From conversations with the experts behind the mills that make some of the world’s most-wanted denim to the global brands bringing novel denim made with TENCEL™ Lyocell and Modal to the market, Carved in Blue shares the stories of those whose roots run deep with denim. Visit www.carvedinblue.tencel.com.