Davide
Cristofaro
Life is not a walk in the park. Most of the time it is harsh, full of sacrifice, hard going. It takes commitment, constancy, perseverance, humility and courage. Follow your passion, work hard to make your dreams real. Every obstacle you meet brings growth and maturity, and every step brings you closer to your goals.
I was born on 16 August 1985 in Putignano and grew up in Martina Franca. The roots of my life run through two parallel worlds: my grandfather Luca, a master tailor, and my grandfather Giuseppe, a painter. Everything I do comes from that double inheritance. In 2007 I bought my first canvas without ever having painted, and I have never stopped since.
A journey between needle and brush
The mastery of tailoring and the magic of painting are interwoven in my family roots. From that meeting comes a path made of passion and dedication, and of stories that reach beyond the seams of time.
The legacy of two grandfathers
The master tailor
Orphaned as a child, he was raised by his aunt Rosina and placed with the village master tailors, keepers of an old craft. He learned the nuance of every needle and thread until he became a pattern maker, cutter and tailor. At twenty he moved to another workshop, where he met a colleague who would become his brother-in-law. He carried that trade on with the same care until he retired.
The painter
His artistic path took shape under the influence of my great-grandfather Pietro, a skilled decorative painter. Unable to study, he began working alongside his father as a child and stayed with him for most of his life, before opening his own workshop: painting, sculpture, decoration and gold-thread embroidery. He married my grandmother Marianna and fathered fourteen children; two survived, my aunt and my father.
A house alive with creativity
My parents, Emma and Antonio, met in Martina Franca, at my aunt Graziella's house. My mother was fifteen, my father twenty-one: my grandfather Luca did not look kindly on them seeing each other, while my grandmother Rosa was very fond of my father. She became a nursery-school teacher; he, after years of working with my grandfather Giuseppe, looked for a steady income and joined the shipping offices of the Ilva plant in Taranto.
Six of us were born from that union: Arianna, Giuseppe, Rosita, Vanessa, Morena and, last, me. For as long as I can remember, every room in the house was alive with colour: someone was always drawing or painting, and my curiosity would send me into hiding to watch my brothers and sisters at work.
Six siblings, one mother tongue: art.
It was not all a straight line
There were hard years, the weight of those who doubted what I was doing, and the first rejections far from home. In every obstacle, though, art remained my refuge and my reason to carry on. From drawing I came to the Victoria Academy in Bari, where I qualified as a Fashion Designer and dedicated my thesis to the grandfather I never met. Today I specialise in fashion and textile design, a sensibility I bring to every form of art I make.
A career in the making
Born in Putignano
Raised in Martina Franca among the artisan traditions of Puglia. Grandfather Luca a tailor, grandfather Giuseppe a painter: a family of six siblings where art is the mother tongue.
Art as a refuge
After the rejections in Rome, Milan and Florence I returned to Puglia. I bought my first canvas, oil paints and brushes without ever having painted. From that day I never stopped. The first group show came in Rome, with hand-painted silks.
Lecce Fashion Weekend 8
My fashion debut came on 5 February 2012, at one of the most representative events of the Fashion System Made in Puglia. Since then I have taken my creations to Paris, London, Stockholm, Bangkok, Moscow, Milan and of course Martina Franca, to the favour of critics and public alike.
Davide Cristofaro is born
Together with my brother Giuseppe I gave life to the brand. Two opposites in balance: I the creative arm, he the rational guide of the company. The winged lion became its symbol.
Four Seasons, Milan
On 17 March 2019 the partnership for the Asian market was made official, after a selection among emerging brands from across Europe. My creations reached China, Japan and Korea.
A return to the roots
After years of experience and of hardship I brought the entire production back to Puglia. Art, Fashion and Design as an authentic expression of our land, with a gaze that reaches as far as Asia.
Recognised internationally
My works belong to distinguished private collections in Italy and abroad. I continue to grow my Davide Cristofaro brand – Art, Fashion and Design Made in Italy – building a path as an Italian designer known around the world.
Art as a universal language
Everything begins as an original drawing. From there it takes three roads: painting on canvas, printing on silk, printing on glass. Art, Fashion and Design are three translations of a single idea.
Traces of Worlds
Works on canvas and paper moving between the figurative and the decorative. Every painting is born of the meeting of distant cultures, between East and West, between ancient and contemporary. Mixed media, materials that carry weight.
Decorative Universe
Patterns and marks that cross beyond the canvas and reach furnishing, textile and accessory. The same painterly imagination becoming a scarf in Como silk or a print on glass. Art entering life without mediation.
From canvas to life
One single mark, three materials. The original drawing becomes painting on canvas, print on silk and print on glass, keeping the same soul intact in every form it takes.
Explore the works
From canvas to silk, from glass to accessory. Every collection is born of the same mark and takes a different form.
Traces of Worlds
Canvas and Paper
A visual journey through ritual signs, symbols, archaic patterns and imagery drawn from different cultures and worlds. Distant elements, ethnic memories and ancestral echoes meet, intertwine and transform through intense colour and a deeply personal pictorial language, giving rise to new figurative and decorative compositions where history, memory and the present coexist.
Explore the collection
Decorative Universe
Canvas and Paper
A visual exploration of line, form and the evocative power of decoration, where patterns, ornaments and motifs inspired by the natural world meet symbols, fantastical creatures and forms in metamorphosis. Figurative and decorative elements intertwine and transform, giving rise to compositions where dream, memory, imagination and a ritual dimension coexist in rhythm, balance and harmony.
Explore the collectionEvents and exhibitions
American Independence Day New York - Miami (America)
Week of the Culture of Uzbekistan and Friends of Pesaro
Alexander Museum Palace Hotel "Gallery of Mirrors", Pesaro, Italy
"MOTHER" The Madonna of the Artists, Pilgrim of Hope, Jubilee 2025
Basilica of Santa Maria in Montesanto "Church of the Artists", Piazza del Popolo, Rome, Italy
International Fashion Exhibition
Showroom, Open Space, Moscow, Russia
The winged lion
The brand is embodied by a winged lion, joining two powerful animals: the lion, strength and courage, and the eagle, power and nobility. It is dedicated to those who believe in their own dreams and do not yield before obstacles.
Every brushstroke is an irreversible choice, as in life.
Davide Cristofaro