C.P. Company

C.P. Company was founded in 1971 in Bologna by Massimo Osti as 'Chester Perry', the original alias drawn from a comic strip character. The name was challenged in court by Perry Ellis and changed to C.P. Company in 1978. From the start, Osti's project was to apply industrial dyeing and weatherproofing techniques to civilian menswear — bringing military and workwear fabrics into a contemporary uniform. The brand's most-recognised garment is the Goggle Jacket — first prototyped around 1988 from a military observer's hood — with the eye-level lenses set into the hood and arm cuff. The Mille Miglia jacket (named for the Italian endurance race), the Soft Shell, and the Explorer Jacket are other Osti signatures. Osti left C.P. Company in 1994 (to focus on his Left Hand and Stone Island ventures) but his design vocabulary continues to drive the brand. C.P. Company changed hands several times before being acquired by First Group Holding in 2015. The brand maintains design offices in Bologna and Modena and operates around 50 stores globally. The unusually deep historical connection to British football casuals — C.P. and Stone Island together formed the canonical 'casual' wardrobe of 1990s Manchester United and Liverpool away days — has given the brand a cultural significance that goes well beyond its commercial scale.