Dear Shaded Viewers,
With the death of Rosita Missoni, the couple who transformed luxury fashions’ view of knitwear is no more. To many the view of knitwear was English classics based; sweaters, comfort, plain and for excitement, textured. When Ottavio Missoni first set up a knitwear company called Venjulia, it was after his success as an Olympic hurdler and through the late 1940’s. However, it was a little later, after he met and married Rosita; who’s family ran a shawl making company, that things became very serious with the launch in 1953 of what would become Missoni. This was the very dawn of Italian fashion in its new phase, which had launched in Florence in 1951. Indeed, it’s important to remember that right up until the 1970’s Florence played a significant role in the establishment of Italian fashion as a global force and player. The original name of the Missoni company was Maglificio Jolly, and it was combining the softness of the shawl techniques of Rosita’s family business with making fashionable garments which changed knitwear forever. By 1958 it was Missoni as we came to know it, and they attracted the attention of Anna Piaggi with their work, shocked audiences in Florence with the semi transparency of their knitwear pieces worn without lingerie, and worked on a collaboration with Emmanuelle Khanh, that they gradually established the name. As they worked growing and consolidating their brand and name through the 1960’s, this led to the first stand alone boutique in 1976, by which time their international fame was truly apparent in editorial coverage. Magazines featured the colours, layers and patterns of Missoni sprawling across the pages, models with neat heads turban wrapped in long Missoni scarves, fluid layers of filigree knitwear slithering to the floor, and hugging the models’ body, this was a totally new view of what the term “knitwear” might mean. It revolutionised the industry leading to designers like Kaffe Fassett and many others entering this specialist area to bring new energy and explore the possibilities enabling companies like Brunello Cuccinelli today to build on the heritage of the Missoni approach and attitude to knitwear from across the many decades since they first dared to make it sexy, exciting and fashion.
The partnership balanced Ottavio’s artistic drawings, paintings, patterns and colours with Rosita’s pieces, construction and silhouettes, the perfectly balanced creative partnership. In 1997 their daughter Angela took over from Rosita as creative director, stepping down in May 2021. Ottavio had died in 2013 after some years of ill health.
The creativity, the stylishness and the quality of Missoni knitwear cannot be underestimated, and their contribution as to how we view knitwear in fashion, as opposed to classic conventional attitudes towards this area of both fashion and clothing, is vital. Their complex layering both in gossamer weights and fluid lines for summer, and their exuberant surface textures for winter is extraordinary, the perfectly judged mixing of pattern upon pattern and the juxtaposition in of the seemingly disparate elements to produce stunning looks is amazing, and the use of colour through the entire spectrum, from monochrome to rich Renaissance intensity is truly marvellous. The attention and weight of creativity between menswear and womenswear always matched and balanced, and the understated sexiness of the Missoni style was also equally apparent.
Their contribution to the history of fashion, and the history of Italian fashion, cannot be underestimated, and at one time the number of Missoni inspired looks abounding throughout the lower end high street fashion stores of the world was numberless. Demonstrating how directional and inspiring their work is, and how revolutionary it was to suddenly view an entire area of the fashion business through a different vision, and with a creative attitude which harnessed technique to realise this vision. Many of the yarns, yarn mixes and compositions, and many of the multi layered, patterned and coloured techniques, were explored by the Missoni’s across the seasons and this exploration underpinned the collections strength. The ideas were matched by their physical realisation in moving knitwear forwards, as much behind the scenes as on the catwalk.
Perhaps one of the best ways to see their work is through the eyes of the great illustrator and artist Antonio. His images unite menswear and womenswear, colour and pattern, texture and weight and glamour in one visual hit.
The death of Rosita Missoni gives us an opportunity to appreciate and review the work of this unique couples contribution to fashion, to savour the beauty of their work and to say thank you for wrestling knitwear away from the merely comfortable and warm. You turned it into a vigorous and fantastical view of what knitting can transform into, in the hands of visionaries; thank you Rosita and Ottavio.
Later,
Tony Glenville
