ROLES
Creative Director
Brand Direction
Design Direction
LOTTO NYC
PROJECT
Creating a line of Streetwear bringing Lotto Sport Italia (widely known in the ‘80s-’00s in Italy for Tennis, Soccer and Basketball) to the US Market.
CHALLENGE
Our challenge was to create a compelling brand using Italian Sport Heritage, original logos and the history of Lotto as a foundation reinterpreted in a modern way.
THEME AND COLOR DEVELOPMENT
One of my favorite aspects of the work I do is creating concepts and narratives for brands and I do this by looking to historial references and considering color, characters, stories and how this can come together to make a compelling theme. The LOTTO NYC project gave me the opportunity to build a creative brand vision for a streetwear brand from scratch with a focus visual storytelling.
This concept was initially pulled from Italian newspaper La Gazzetta dello Sport featuring Luca Toni, a prominent soccer player from the ‘00-’10s. I was inspired by the colorful ground of the newspaper with different pops of color in the pictures and text. Newspaper detailing, unique typography and paper-like effects became the foundation of this concept for our launch collection along with the mixture of unexpected pattern and color combinations.
LA GAZETTA: LAUNCH COLLECTION
GARMENT LOOK AND FEEL
We aimed for high end quality fabrics and finishes all through the lens of a retro sensibility--we used specialty fabrics and trims from true full needle rib sweater trim and Italian mesh piecing so that each garment could stand as it's own item as well as being part of the collection. To see more looks see full look book:
full look book
GRAPHIC ARTWORK
I created original graphic artworks for by researching various aspects in the history of Lotto as a brand and its' players. We started with soccer as a main inspiration--these graphics play with text, numbers and different textures and line weights to give each image a distinct character. For more original graphics created for LottoNYC see here
MORE CONCEPT DEVELOPMENT
Concept was based on current graphic trends in 3D Imagery and inverted color which create an imperfect and digitized feel. I was inspired by RayGun Magazine from the late 90’s to early 2000s with it's unique use of typography and unexpected graphic placement(s). I wanted to connect the idea of Italy’s soccer stadiums also being venues for many great pop and rock concerts. This melding of Sport and Music set the tone for this concept as well as the use of yellow/gold as pop colors comes from “The Golden Boot”—an award given to the top goal scorer in Europe each season--and won by Luca Toni who was our first season inspiration.
PHOTOS FOR MOOD BOARD PURPOSES ONLY, I DO NOT CLAIM OWNERSHIP OF IMAGERY
CREATIVE
I spearheaded creative while consulting for Lotto from the creation of looks and collaborating with photographers and stylists while compiling bids and working through photoshoot budgeting. As a startup we needed to be very versatile with our dollars and get a wide number of shots for use in all manner of content. To see more looks see full look book:
full look book
1973: CONCEPT AND GRAPHIC ART
In the second phase of our brand development we embraced New York City as the core of our brand--in keeping with historical threads
I focused on Lotto's first brand amassador who was John Newcombe who won the US Open in 1973 in the borough of Queens, New York City. This gave me a starting point to look at cultural touch points in the year 1973. Again using music mixing with art was a great foundation for making graphics. For more original graphics created for LottoNYC see here
1973
I was inspired by the record art of Stevie Wonder's Innervisions (which was released in 1973 and was the #1 selling album in 1974; often considered one of Stevie Wonder's strongest albums, I liked the idea of taking the layout of the original album and putting New York City elements into it to express Lotto NYC as a contemporary streetwear brand. In the same way, I created another graphic artwork by looking at the cover art of the band War and their album The World is a Ghetto--this album was released in 1972 and became the best-selling album of 1973. Keeping the layout but using more color and layers created our "World is a"Tee".
