admin Photo: Jemal Countess/Getty Images
In an interview with the newly-revived Paper Magazine, Rio Uribe announced that, after ten years and a return to New York Fashion Week this past season, he’s closing Gypsy Sport, the CFDA/Vogue Fashion Fund Award-winning brand he founded and designed for, as we know it.
Uribe told the publication that he was left with “so much PTSD” after a downpour plagued the Governors Island-set runway in September. “It was my first time in a few years back in New York doing a show — and even if you’re not having a show, it’s already a stressful city,” he said. “So to put on a runway with a small team was a ton of work and super expensive.”
When Uribe returned to his home in Los Angeles, he knew he was planning to close the brand. However, with disappointment in how New York Fashion Week transpired, he joined the Los Angeles Fashion Week schedule last-minute, offering his brand “something much more celebratory.”
“New York was like a goodbye to Gypsy Sport — the name, the brand as we know it and what I started there,” Uribe told Andrew Nguyen. “LA was a hello, planting our seeds and saying, ‘We are here to stay, and this is who we are now.'”
Gypsy Sport was founded in 2012, and won the CFDA/Vogue Fashion Fund three years later. Uribe’s not done with fashion: He’s working on a new brand that doesn’t have a name yet, but will focus on vegan leather handbags and accessories, which had been a recent development for Gypsy Sport.
“This year, we launched our logo bag, which took about six or seven months to develop the perfect sample, and it’s launching November 6,” Uribe told Paper. “They’re made in India from vegan leather. We’ll have new colors and new sizes launching in March.”
“I have to admit though that changing the brand name now is heartbreaking for me. It honestly gave me a bit of an identity crisis, like, ‘What? Who am I going to be now?,'” he continued. “But it’s the right thing to do, and I feel great about it now. Ten years feels like the perfect time to change and start fresh.”
Never miss the latest fashion industry news. Sign up for the Fashionista daily newsletter.
