RODO INDUSTRY PROJECT | MASTER ACCESSORIES DESIGN

July 19, 2024 | Our Master’s students in Accessory Design have completed their experience with Rodo, an Italian leaderin leather goods and shoes.

In the presence of Gianni Dori, the Owner of the Maison, the students presented their Final Projects. These projects included material analysis and costing, experiments on leather and related materials, culminating in the development ofsix women’s shoes and four women’s bags, with prototypes created in collaboration with the Company.

The goal of this project was to create a research and development laboratory that, by analysing the identity and codes of the brand, interpreted them through a personal and unexpected lens. Primary and secondary investigation and experimentation aimed to build a professional project that emphasised the transposition of the brand’s heritage and characteristics into a future-oriented vision. Innovation in materials and processes was key to defining a new standard of excellence.

Starting from Rodo’s archives, its heritage, and DNA, the students were invited to conduct research aimed at creating a capsule collection of women’s bags and shoes to define a new visionary interpretative model. The project development aimed to propose visions aligned with a global and contemporary market.

CRAFTSMEN. For Rodo, beauty is handmade, respecting nature and tradition. Artisan knowledge is understood as mastery of the craft and skill of the gesture: manual work serves the idea, the form, the creative proposal, giving life to small and true works of art. Founded in 1956 with the creation of wicker bags, Rodo quickly became an iconic brand, today aimed at high-spending women aged 25 to 50. Production, still carried out at the plant founded in Mogliano in 1962, has over time integrated craftsmanship with research. Iconic and continuous elements, the development of innovative and increasingly sustainable materials (untreated leathers, the use of wicker) to limit environmental impact, are some of the brand’s codes. Rodo represents, through its history and vocation, one of the emblems of the birth of Made in Italy. Engaging with such a history-rich, skilled, and savoir-faire reality, while being driven by research and innovation, is a stimulating challenge and a privileged field of investigation for those wishing to develop their professionalism in this sector.