C.P. Company, the Italian outerwear brand founded by legendary graphic designer and fashion entrepreneur Massimo Osti, is preparing to launch an experimental label dedicated to textile innovation.
The new brand, Massimo Osti Studio, will reveal its designs (by creative director Robert Newman) at an event on Jan. 17 during menswear week in Paris.
Osti, who passed away in 2005, remains an iconic figure in the worlds of sportswear and streetwear. He founded a string of Italian sportswear brands including C.P. Company and Stone Island during the 1970s and 1980s, helping to popularise techniques like screen printing and garment dyeing clothes. As a former graphic designer, Osti applied processes from the time, like Xerox and decoupage, to create a unique aesthetic.
As Italy’s burgeoning ready-to-wear ecosystem collided with America’s casualising influence on culture, Osti’s obsession with textile innovation allowed his brands to put an Italian, artisanal spin on popular menswear archetypes.
Osti’s combination of graphic logos and patches, a broken-in look and references to military, outdoor and work attire was adopted as a badge of identity for various consumer tribes, ranging from Milan’s paninari — a 1980s street culture obsessed with designer clothes — to football hooligans in the UK.
While Stone Island gradually reinforced its presence in the Italian market and abroad, leading to a €1.2 billion ($1.4 billion) sale to Moncler in late 2020, Osti’s C.P. Company languished. It underwent a series of ownership changes before being relaunched in 2015 by Tristate Holdings, a Hong Kong-based manufacturing and fashion licensing group, with leadership from Massimo Osti’s son Lorenzo.
C.P. Company’s sales and profits have grown steadily under Tristate, which reported around $280 million in revenue for its owned brands’ and licenses division last year. (Challenges at other brands including Spyder, Nautica, and Reebok still led the division to report a loss.)
Massimo Osti Studio will serve as the “the lab of C.P.” as the group seeks to reinforce its textile innovation practice and reawaken its heritage, Osti said. The hope was to raise awareness of Osti’s legacy in a way that didn’t feel nostalgic, while giving the brand a chance to connect with different audiences.
The new line will be sold direct-to-consumer online and through activations in partnership with select retailers rather than via the company’s existing distribution network.
“We wanted to isolate it, to keep it pure and clean; to have the room to experiment 360 without risking confusion about what C.P. Company is,” said Osti. ”It’s like a sandbox for outerwear innovation.”
The first drops will include a product capsule using Alcantara, an ultra-durable material more often seen in cars, as well as collaborations with tool-maker Leatherman and the sailor Alberto Riva.
