How Calvin Klein is Made–For their September issue, Surface magazine looks to Calvin Klein men’s creative director Italo Zucchelli and Calvin Klein women’s creative director Francisco Costa as they celebrate ten years at the American label. Discussing the difference between Klein’s vision for menswear and his own, Zucchelli expresses, “The core vision of Calvin Klein is timeless, sophisticated, minimal, and clean. I’ve continued elements that he established long ago, like the idea of athleticism. But I also add extreme color, like I did with the fluorescent colors in my new collection. I play with new materials, too, different kinds of shapes. I’m adding to the vocabulary, but always keeping it in sync with what it used to be.”
Discussing the evolution of the brand, Zucchelli continues “There was a specific moment. It was my seventh show. At that moment, I felt, ‘Okay, this is the way that I’m going to go.’ I felt it very clearly. From then on, I was going to explore new technologies. That was the beginning of a new trajectory. It was like there was a ‘before that’ and an ‘after that.’ In the show, there was a swimsuit I did. Everybody called the piece ‘leggings,’ but it was a swimsuit. It got a lot of stir in the room. It was quite dramatic. I wasn’t trying to be noticed. It was just the direction I was taking the collection: new materials, new technologies. Now I’m in a phase where I balance that kind of innovation with pure luxury. I’m adding other layers, like graphics or different shapes. It’s an ongoing evolution.”
