LVMH Luxury Ventures Invests in Madhappy Streetwear Brand

Louis Vuitton Moet Hennessy (LVMH) has added another label to its investment portfolio, Los Angeles based streetwear label Madhappy.

The two-year-old label, founded by four twentysomething friends in Los Angeles, received the largest investment contribution of its $1.5 million seed round from LVMH Luxury Ventures subsidiary which also backed designer label Gabriela Hearst and sneaker/streetwear firm Stadium Goods, the latter of which was recently acquired by Farfetch. Other seed round investors also included Tommy Hilfiger and the founders of Sweetgreen.

Madhappy, with a core following amongst 18 to 30 year-olds, creates higher-priced streetwear staples with positivity-centric messaging. While many streetwear labels have a largely male audience, Madhappy’s customers are more evenly split between men and women. The brand launched online but now has outposts on Melrose Place in Los Angeles and Howard Street in New York, and has developed popups in locations such as Miami and Aspen. Their offering has gained a following among celebrities like Gigi Hadid, Steph Curry, Katy Perry, and Cardi B.

Th move by LVMH has indicated the luxury labels openness to investing in a brand that is less inclusive than traditional luxury labels and also more focused on positive emotional narrative.

Cofounder Peiman Raf says that the brand is on a mission to make the world a more optimistic place by creating conversations around mental health.

“Growing up, we found that many streetwear labels seemed to be very exclusive, and we wanted to create a brand that was the opposite of that,” he says. “But we want to take it a step further and start conversations about mental health. Many of our events are focused on talking about mental health issues that most people don’t often talk about publicly.”