Fashion designer Todd Snyder remembers the first time he learned a celebrity was a fan of his work. It was 2013, just two years after he launched his eponymous menswear brand following career-making turns at Ralph Lauren, Gap Inc. and J. Crew.
“We were all sitting there together because it was maybe only five of us in the company. We were still very small,” Snyder recalls. “The guy who runs our e-comm said, ‘Oh my God, Ryan Gosling just ordered from us!’ We were small enough that we could see orders when they came in.”
Since then, Snyder has become a go-to designer for celebrities. Hudson Williams, Sterling K. Brown, Colman Domingo, Noah Wyle, Daniel Radcliffe, Tom Francis, Brendan Fraser, Jim Parsons and Aaron Tveit are just some of the bold-faced names who have worn Todd Snyder on red carpets and at other starry events.
“In my mind Todd Snyder’s work is simultaneously instantly recognizable and yet never has the stink of screaming for attention,” Gosling’s sylist Mark Avery tells me. “An eye for detail, fit and fabric that never leans on spectacle. I’m forever a fan.”
Ryan Gosling wears a Todd Snyder three-piece suit to the 2017 “La La Land” premiere in Paris.
Corbis via Getty Images
Celebrity stylist Warren Alfie Baker has dressed several clients, including Glen Powell, Matt Bomer and Regé-Jean Page, in the brand. “He has a great mix of vintage style pieces with cool Americana vibes,” Baker says. “It really covers all the bases from amazing casual wear to formal wear.”
Snyder was at the CFDA Awards in 2012 as a nominee when he met Bomer. “Matt was in front of me, and he turns around and goes, ‘Todd, I love your stuff,’” Snyder says. “The fact that he even knew who I was, let alone that he likes the clothes and would say that, it was awesome. He’s been a dear friend since.”
“The Gilded Age” actor Ben Ahlers stars in the new campaign for the Todd Snyder and Lagavulin whiskey capsule collection.
Snyder will celebrate his company’s 15th anniversary on Sunday during New York Fashion Week with a party at Baretto that also serves as the launch of his new capsule collection with Lagavulin Single Malt Scotch whisky. “The Gilded Age” actor Ben Ahlers stars in the capsule’s upcoming “Time & Craft” ad campaign.
Snyder and Ahlers were introduced to each other about a year ago and immediately bonded over both being from Iowa.
“I didn’t know at the time he was from Iowa,” Snyder says. “We went right to what we both remember and what we love about Iowa. We have a similar kind of feeling about Iowa and how it kind of centers us and cuts through the noise a little bit. I’ve lived in New York City 30-plus years and I love the hustle and bustle, but it’s always nice to hear I’m not the only one who appreciates the simplicity of things.”
Ahlers attended Snyder’s Spring 2026 runway show last September. “It took me a few years to settle into New York, its rhythms, and the vastness of its intersecting worlds,” Ahlers tells me via email. “I remember learning Todd was from Iowa. He had gone to Iowa State, which has been part of my family for generations, and his success and mastery made me feel like I wasn’t at a disadvantage by growing up outside of the city. In fact, it turned out to be what made me feel like I had something unique to offer.”
Ahlers’ Snyder x Lagavulin campaign — styled by Jim Moore and photographed by Boo George — was shot at the whisky company’s distillery on Islay, Scotland. Ahlers, who made his Broadway debut earlier this year in the Tony-winning “Death of a Salesman” revival, says the capsule’s suede stable jacket is one of his favorite pieces because “it feels unmistakably Todd Snyder, but has this real piece of Scottish craft built into it.”
The full Lagavulin collection will be available online and in select Todd Snyder stores on Oct. 8.
Matt Berninger of The National will perform at the anniversary soiree. A longtime fan of The National, Snyder says he was gobsmacked when Berninger reached out to him about three years ago.
“They said, ‘Matt Berninger wants to have breakfast with you, would love to meet you,’” Snyder says. “I’m like, ‘Are you kidding? I would love to do that.’ I’d been to probably a dozen concerts of theirs up until that point, and he’s like, ‘Would you dress me? Can you be my guy? I don’t want to deal with anybody else.’ That was everything because I looked at him as a bit of a fashion hero.”
