MCM

Michael Cromer founded MCM in Munich in 1976, and by the 1980s his cognac Visetos monogram, crowned with a laurel wreath, had become one of the decade's great status symbols. The company splintered in the 1990s; in 2005 Sung-joo Kim's Sungjoo Group, of Seoul, bought the worldwide rights and relaunched the label a year later. Leather goods remain its heart, above all the Visetos backpack, alongside ready-to-wear, shoes and fragrance for women and men.