My first encounter with sportswear came about 35 years ago, when I was a young engineer in Hong Kong, recently graduated and looking forward to the idea of ‘playing’ adult, wearing a London Fog trench coat over my suit, and carrying a leather briefcase to the office for the first time in my life.
By chance, one day around this time, I was flipping through a magazine and saw a photo of a model in a classic Italian suit, but over it he was wearing a brightly coloured, sharply-styled parka by a brand I’d never heard of: Massimo Osti’s C.P. Company.
The image struck a chord, I was excited but not quite sure why. I didn’t yet know what made that parka so special; I didn’t know about the complex multiple fabric garment dyeing the jacket had undergone, the research that went into creating a fabric like 50 fili or any of the other sportswear innovations which made this parka so compelling, so unique.
A long time has passed then, a lot has changed in terms of the way the industry operates but my experience, both as a manufacturer and as a global traveller has only strengthened my passion for luxury sportswear. The lightweight, versatile, highly functional and visually spectacular garments which can be produced from hybrid combinations of luxury clothing and high performance sportswear are not only a formula for innovative visual communication and fashion they are also what today’s larger, globally-savvy and connected jet set demand for their on-the-move lifestyles!
Trinovation was founded to create a structured laboratory environment which could best push the boundaries of what luxury sportswear can become. It is a point of pride that the team which has embarked on this journey together is made up not just of talents, such as Sophie Sun and Sadie Chang, who have been developed within Tristate, but also international talents.
Peter Wang, Chairman and CEO
July 2014