Joe Ando-Hirsh is not your average TikTok-famous influencer, charming viewers with his relatable humour and boy-next-door charisma. The 29-year-old Fashion Institute of Technology graduate is also a talented designer whose clientele includes Dakota Johnson, Keke Palmer and, most recently, Icelandic crooner Laufey.

Ando-Hirsh has almost three million followers on Instagram and nearly six million across all his social media platforms – and he built it brick-by-brick. The social-first designer kicked off his online account making dresses for his friends before celebrities including Millie Bobby Brown Brown and former vice president Kamala Harris’ stepdaughter Ella Emhoff began appearing in his videos.

The Ando-Hirsh custom dress that Emhoff wore to the Democratic National Convention in Chicago in August last year made waves in the media, with several outlets awarding Emhoff the title of “best dressed at the DNC”.

This year, Ando-Hirsh was listed as one of Forbes 30 Under 30 creators for social media. Here’s everything you need to know about the designer.

Joe Ando-Hirsh was born in India to a French father and a Japanese mother. The 29-year-old told Glamour in a 2024 interview that watching his parents struggle in their own creative fields while growing up in Long Island, New York, made him crave stability.

Ando-Hirsh was intent on pursuing a safe and stable career in finance, but after failing a statistics class, he made a drastic change and enrolled himself in fashion school.