Loris Messina

Loris Messina is a French-born fashion designer and creative director from Grenoble. He studied marketing and economics and worked in visual merchandising at Gucci before co-founding SUNNEI with Simone Rizzo in Milan in 2014. Neither founder had formal design training; the label began as a direct-to-consumer menswear project assembled through self-teaching, local production and a network of friends working across photography, music and architecture.

Under Messina and Rizzo, SUNNEI expanded into womenswear in 2018 and then into co-ed ready-to-wear, footwear, accessories, objects, digital experiments and retail environments. They sold a majority stake to Vanguards Group in 2020 and continued directing the label through a period of organisational growth that culminated in the Palazzina SUNNEI headquarters, store, café and gallery. Their Spring/Summer 2026 mock auction became both a fashion-system satire and their farewell; the pair left the company in September 2025.

Aeffe appointed Messina and Rizzo joint creative directors of Moschino on 21 June 2026. The appointment placed two founders experienced in product, communication and independent brand-building at the head of women’s, men’s and accessories, but their first collection for the house had not yet been presented at the research cutoff.

Messina’s work at SUNNEI developed from intuitive wardrobe needs rather than academic design rules. Broad trousers, compact knitwear, striped surfaces, rounded accessories and clear colour were treated as repeatable parts of a product language, with Italian manufacture supporting forms that appeared simple but depended on controlled volume and finish.

He and Rizzo did not divide clothing from communication. Shops, casting, sound, websites and runway behaviour belonged to the same design system, and their shows repeatedly turned the audience into an active component: flash mobs, crowd-surfing models, scoring paddles and the final mock auction exposed how fashion is watched, judged and sold. The spectacle worked because recognisable, wearable product remained its fixed point.

Messina also brought commercial structure into the creative process. SUNNEI moved from direct sales to wholesale growth, consolidated its seasonal calendar and built adaptable spaces where retail, work and cultural events could coexist. His practice is therefore less about an isolated signature than about joining garments, image, distribution and place into one legible environment.