Douglas Tompkins, the man who in the ‘80s founded both North Face and Esprit with his ex-wife/ardent Democratic party supporter Susie Tompkins Buell, died this week at the age of 72. WWD reports the cause as a boating accident in Chile—Tompkins was a longtime conservationist and fan of the outdoors, and he built his companies to serve those interests, starting Esprit in 1968 San Francisco and initially selling garments out the back of a VW bus.
