California Apparel News

Italian luxury brand Roberto Cavalli had several factors to consider before adopting 2-D and 3-D CAD software solution.

“Timetables are becoming tighter and tighter,” said Paolo Ottolia, head of ready-to-wear products at Roberto Cavalli, in a company statement. “The challenge is how to integrate something handmade, which is actually the nature of our product, with all the needs of our industry—the marketing needs, validation needs and the timetables.”

“Our products are very complicated, made of prints and materials with a lot of embroidery, with very specific requirements. The prints must be very meticulously planned. This brings complexities that only technology can help to solve or simplify.”

The company added the Optitex 2-D Pattern Making and Optitex 3-D Virtual Prototyping CAD Suites.

Roberto Cavalli releases six collections annually following a production schedule that allows an average of two months for the design and development of each new collection. In the past, to see how a print would look in the final garment, the company would create a three-dimensional representation of a garment in paper—a process that could require 70 individual pieces of paper, said Michele Mazzanti, the CAD department manager at Cavalli.

“To get a three-dimensional idea of the print on the style, we used to cut paper with scissors and afterwards attach the pieces with adhesive tape, like a seamstress would do with a pattern and pins,” Mazzanti said. “We would close the pleats, folds and frills, which was very slow work.”

With the addition of Optitex, the company can now use a smart digital tool to do the same process much faster.

“3-D is not only an alternative to the prototype,” Mazzanti said. “We see it as an option for implementing what is difficult to implement. The next step is to be able to provide our customers in the showroom with the option of seeing the ready item without touching it and then turning around, seeing it on the wall and saying it’s identical.”

Based in Petach-Tikva, Israel, with its U.S. headquarters in New York and offices in Europe, Asia, India, Latin America and Africa, Optitex creates 2-D and 3-D software solutions to help fashion and apparel makers automate and optimize their product development and virtual prototyping processes, lower costs, and improve their speed to market.