Well suited: Teenage boys from Jerusalem's Satmar hasidic community wear coats that may be similar to that bought by Ms Hooker when she visited Israel aged 18
It's a beautifully cut and timeless piece - camel wool, dark chocolate brown detailing and a line that elongates and flatters: The London Contrast coat is one of the Duchess of Cambridge's most elegant wardrobe choices.
But while some lucky women, royalty in their midst, are proud owners of the Katherine Hooker's creations, one anonymous Israeli boy was the inspiration behind the whole label.
Ms Hooker told New York Magazine that her business is built upon one humble, perfectly-cut coat that she came across in a vintage store in Israel when she was a teenager.
I bought a young boy's Hasidic coat in a junk shop,' she told the magazine.
And it was an old one, like when clothes used to be made for people as opposed to mass market. I was 18 and tiny and skinny, and it fit me absolutely perfectly; it was made for a 14-year-old boy or something.
The London-based designer described the coat to MailOnline, painting a picture of a luxurious frock coat. She said it was 'black silk with a little collar, cut small shoulders, straight down' and like her label's current Opera coat but with a Tallulah jacket collar.
The coat became an instant favourite, she told the magazine - leading to copies being made and friends clamoring for their own versions of the design.
Business was born, remembers Ms Hooker, and she went on to open a shop in London in 2004.
She owes much of her success to the Duchess of Cambridge, who is a devoted admirer of her sharp tailoring. The stylish dresser wore a Katherine Hooker dress coat to a Cheltenham racecourse event in 2006 and then updated the look by raising the hemline for the launch of a lifeboat in Wales in February of last year.
She also owns a blue wool Alexander jacket by the label. Ms Hooker told the magazine that fans of the Duchess are not uncommon in her London store.
We had this one girl who wanted the exact same blue Alexander jacket Kate has,' she said. 'So I had the exact same stuff that was made by a different mill, and stupidly I said, "Well, it wasn’t made by the same — " And literally her bottom lip was starting to wobble, and she was like, "I really want the same one!" But she was very sweet.
Pippa Middleton wore a camel coat with contrasting velvet pockets to a wedding last December and princesses Eugenie and Beatrice are also clients.
The designer is quick to quell critics who see a lack of fashion edginess in the Duchess' wardrobe.
She does have quite a strength in her style. Although it’s very conservative, there is something that sets her apart from just your average nice, conservative, well-brought-up girl. She’s managed to do something - and I can’t quite put my finger on what it is', she told the magazine.
I think a lot of people think that she dresses very boringly, that she should be more fashion-forward and all that, but I think that she’s a very strong person, she has a strong personality.
Ms Hooker says that her royal customer knows exactly what suits her and what to avoid - a strength of character that makes her stand out from other clients she has.
Her tailoring, while expensive - with most coats costing more than $1,000 - uses old techniques that are impossible to find in modern major retail chains, she explains: 'They’re made much more in the way clothes used to be made before everybody had their clothes mass produced. The structured, more tailored styles are cut with high armholes so they’re very elongating, which also gives you mobility.
She also says that much of the cost of the garments come from wasteful - but wonderfully striking - pattern cutting involving many panels of fabric.
The designer opened a pop-up store in New York for a short period in December. The venture saw her British designs - and their royal acumen - hit the fashion-forward streets of SoHo.
As for the savvy business woman opening any more permanent stores in the U.S., the designer carefully avoids committing either way.
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