Emilio Cavallini

Biography

From 1964 to 1966 he attended College in Florence “Universita’ di Firenze, Economia e Commercio”. He quit college because of this fascination with the world of fashion and went to the "Swinging London". He met Mary Quant, his passion for hosiery started and started to dress women’s legs with patterned hosiery. He developed pantyhoses with black/white patterns, dots, starts and skulls, stripes, animal and different kids of fishnets. He loved the fluorescent colors.

In 1970 he opened in San Miniato his own company, Stilnovo Spa. Besides Mary Quant he started producing for the most important brands such as Dior, Celine, Roberta di Camerino, Balenciaga, Gucci, Alexander McQueen and more..

In 1980 he launched his own brand of Emilio Cavallini hosiery. It was an immediate success, he started designing shoes, leather accessories, bathing suits and a full avante garde clothing line for young men and women. Licensees' retail stores started to open in Florence, Milan, Rome, Paris, Düsseldorf, London, Hong Kong and Tokyo. He had a runway show in Paris with his line for men and in Milan for women. He became member for Milan Chamber of Fashion. In the 1980s he believed that the time to look for new clothing forms is over and he started to develop clothing without seams on special seamless machines with large cylinders that were intended for hosiey. He launches the collection in New York and continues developing a large tight that covers the whole body.

In 2009 Stilnovo S.p.A. produces 4 million fashion tights per year and sells worldwide. Currently he is working on a building and archive with the patterns and techniques he developed in 40 years of design. He also nourishes his passion for current and ancient art. This passion leads him to build art pieces of various forms and dimensions using tights as if they were strings, he uses his mathematical knowledge to figure out the tensions of yarns.

Awards, Prizes and Acknowledgments