Carlo Brandelli is an English-born designer, he is primarily known as a menswear designer, but is also working as a sculptor. He was voted Menswear Designer of the Year in 2005 by the British Fashion Council.
Menswear career
His first work was Squire, launched in 1991, where Carlo fused the ideas of art, architecture and design by pioneering one of the first 'creative director roles' in fashion, it was the first project of its type to draw and encompass many different types of design aesthetics into a concept space in Mayfair which epitomised the beginnings of Cool Britannia. The gallery displayed design collections within the same space as classic ‘pop art’ pieces from artists such as Allen Jones and Bridget Riley. Early collaborators, clients and admirers of Squire were Alexander Mcqueen, Massive Attack, Kate Moss, Helmut Lang and most of the iconoclasts of design, music and style scenes. Nick Knight and Peter Saville were initial collaborators. Squire questioned the boundaries between design, fashion and art, pioneering a more open and broad spectrum of how designers were perceived to be able to work within other creative disciplines and mediums. Initially specialising in tailoring, Carlo used traditional Savile Row craft together with relevant modern design principles. It was during this period that Carlo started to work on unstructured tailoring, with the first ideas produced in 1999. Unstructured tailoring changed the way tailoring was seen, up until then full structured heavier suits with interlinings and horse hair chest pieces was the norm. Carlo wanted to design tailoring that was completely unlined and without internal structure, allowing the cut to dictate any external shape. The designs were lighter and more comfortable. He christened the work "Unstructured Tailoring" and the menswear industry has adopted this term to define all design of this nature. During this period Carlo worked as a freelance menswear designer for Burberry and Valentino in Japan. After five years of the concept work at Squire and having achieved all that he had set out to for this project, unexpectedly in 2003 Kilgour approached Carlo to become creative director. This project offered an opportunity to define and work on creating and building every element of a new Kilgour, a different ‘type’ of creative and artistic work. Carlo set the brief to create a modern hybrid menswear brand combining the craft and heritage of Savile Row with all aspects of modern current design. Carlo conceived the concept of the brand, controlled all design, designed the flagship spaces and the campaigns. The project was critically and commercially very successful with Carlo receiving many diverse plaudits and awards including British GQ Most Stylish Man and being voted Menswear Designer of the Year in 2005 by the British Fashion Council, the highest award achievable in this field. In 2008 Kilgour changed ownership shortly before Carlo's debut on the Paris catwalk in 2009, Carlo promptly resigned, leaving the brand he founded as Kilgour. In 2013 Kilgour changed hands again and the new owners approached Carlo to reprise his role as freelance creative director, the remit was to re-position Kilgour as an "International Contemporary Bespoke Brand and Tailor".
Artist career
In 2009 Carlo established his own studio working with clients privately as a consultant design and creative director. The studio also focuses on artistic work, his first sculpture solo show ‘Permanence 2010 - Travertine marble stone & gold’ opened on June 25, 2010 at RCM Galerie in Paris. In October 2010, some Permanence pieces were also shown at the Art Elysees Contemporary Art Fair in Paris together with the art/design specialist crossover gallery RCM. In October 2011 several works were made in collaboration with the American contemporary artistMatthew Brannon with Casey Kaplan Gallery New York and shown at London’s Frieze Art Fair. Carlo produced a series of abstract coat sculptures made from rubber coated cotton as part of Matthew’s work with Casey Kaplan. Matthew Brannon’s solo show then opened in New York at Casey Kaplan in October 2011 and Carlo worked on several collaborative pieces which have been acquired by the acclaimed Contemporary Rennie Collection at Wing Sang gallery in Vancouver. For 2013 several glass works were made in Murano as part of a ‘floating series’, all pieces were acquired by a private collection, a second series entitled ‘Left Glass' was produced in 2016 and shown at RCM Galerie in Paris. Carlo was chosen as the prestigious Pitti Uomo show guest designer project in 2015, where he showed a 6-square meter coloured glass installation in the courtyard of the Medici Palazzo in Florence, the installation was part of his presentation on menswear. In 2017 Carlo was one of only a handful of menswear designers that was chosen to show in MOMA Museum Of Modern Art New York seminal show ' Is fashion Modern ', where important designs spanning the last 100 years were chosen for the major exhibition. Carlo's Unstructured suit design work for tailoring was selected. Carlo is a regular lecturer on design and is an established commentator to the international design scene.
