Angela Missoni resigns as creative director of Missoni after 24 years

The designer, 62, will stay on as president of the family-run fashion house

Angela Missoni with some of her bright and colourful collections in Dubai in 2012. Jeffrey E Biteng / The National 

Angela Missoni is leaving the role of creative director after 24 years at the Missoni fashion house founded by her parents, Ottavio and Rosita.

Missoni, 62, announced the move in an interview with The Business of Fashion published on Tuesday, indicating that the naming of a new chief executive during the pandemic and the role of a private investment fund in backing the fashion house had given her "the confidence" to make the move.

Design director Alberto Caliri, who has worked alongside Missoni for 15 years, will take over the creative role for an interim.

“My parents invented a new language in fashion,” Missoni told the publication. “And I think over the past 25 years I’ve been able to extend the lexicon of this language.”

Missoni will stay on as president of the family-run fashion house, while other family members retain roles in the company, including her mother, who runs MissoniHome.

Speaking to trade publication WWD, chief executive Livio Proli said Missoni showed "sensibility and courage as well as foresight" with the decision.

The restructuring would "kick-start the third cycle of the company with a new injection of energy and creative strength," he said.

"She will accompany the evolution of the brand, but she realised she would have conditioned the company in staying on as creative director," Proli said.

Other recent changes include closing the secondary line M Missoni in March. It was being run by Missoni's daughter, Margherita.

The Missoni family maintains majority control of the house, after selling a 41.2 per cent stake to the Italian investment fund FSI in 2018.

Prioli was hired in May 2020 after a long tenure at Giorgio Armani.

"I am sure that Livio Proli, with his talent and wealth of experience, will be able to enhance Missoni's potential and steer its team with the right leadership," Angela Missoni told WWD then. "I look forward to starting our collaboration and to facing up together to our future ambitious projects."

In a 2011 interview with Vogue  to mark his 90th birthday, Ottavio, who died in 2013, said of his children: "I never pushed them to pursue this career, but I'm happy because they chose the company themselves. And we all agree it's a family firm and it must remain as such.

"We are not capable of creating a huge company. I always say that you can launch a boat that weighs 100,000 tons, but then you must sail it and have the right crew," he said.

– Additional reporting by AP