Gio-Goi: Interview

The Gio-Goi brand has been a worldwide hit since it relaunched in 2005. Here we speak to Adam Ward, the footwear designer at the label about drawing shoes in art class and how he wouldn’t change his job for anything, not even a shot at the Olympic championships!

PlanetNotion: How did your career as a footwear designer at Gio-Goi come about?

Adam Ward: My career at Gio-Goi footwear started just over 1 year ago. Whilst working for an American brand, Pentland approached me about a young casual fashion brand they were in partnership with. My passion for casual sports footwear along with the energy I felt after meeting Gio-Goi made my decision to join the team very easy.

PN: What influenced you to focus on footwear design? Is it a world that you have always been destined to work in?

AW: From a young age I have loved sport and in every subject at school I would try and involve sport as much as I could. As a child I would always choose to take shoes or trainers into my art classes to draw, which I guess is where my passion for drawing shoes began to grow and develop. My main hobbies have always been sports and design. When finally realizing I wasn’t ever going to be an Olympic champion the ideal option was to combine both my love of design with sport, which naturally led me into footwear design. I don’t know if I was destined to be a footwear designer, but I wouldn’t change it for the world.

PN: Tell us a little about Gio-Goi as a brand and how does this brand identity influence your designs?

AW: Gio-Goi is a British fashion brand created in the 1980’s and one that was recently re-launched in 2005. The label has its roots in the Manchester band scene of the late 1980’s, a period that mixed indie rock and dance music. Gio-Goi oozes energy, passion and colour and clearly is a brand with a young, fresh and original image. With the brand’s heritage at the forefront of their minds, the clothing and footwear teams work closely together to try and create a true ‘Gio-Goi look.’

PN: When designing the Collections do you have a particular type of consumer in mind?

AW: Gio-Goi has three key DNA segments and therefore 3 consumers in mind. ‘Contraband’ is a premium line that fuses casualwear and denim with a rock ‘n’ roll spirit.  Gio-Goi’s ‘Mainline’ consists of urban casualwear and denim. The ‘Trackstar’ range is centered on the dance arena and consists of young casual sportswear with a fresh twist. This DNA helps us identify a look and gives us a feel for what each consumer needs and desires.

PN: The AW11 Collection consists of an eclectic mix of styles and colours- how would you describe it and what kind of things influenced the collection?

AW: The main influence has to be the brand, what we stand for and who we are, this is at the heart of every collection. We also need to be aware of the key trends for the season. For AW11 we picked up on the strong military trend and gave it the ‘Gio-Goi factor’. As well as looking at key fashion trends we also make sure we look outside of footwear and clothing at other brands product design as detailing is key in these areas.

PN: What is in store for Gio-Goi over the next six months?

AW: The next few months will be very exciting for Gio-Goi with a number of things in the pipeline, the launch of Gio-Goi’s Manchester store and the new SS12 footwear range, amongst others. Watch this space!

Check out the Gio-Goi site here.