Meet Reynaldo Aquino of Fortis Orbis Atelier in Wilmington

Today we’d like to introduce you to Reynaldo Aquino.

So, before we jump into specific questions about the business, why don’t you give us some details about you and your story.
I’ve always been interested in fashion if I can remember. But my career didn’t start in fashion but in Graphic Design. I’ve worked in the graphic design industry for thirty years. After thinking seriously about what’s next in my future and yet stay in a creative field. I decided to have a career in fashion and be my own boss. So, I started out in owning my own business with a business partner and called it Rey Aquino Design. It was my first dive into men’s fashion. Within the five years I started with my first brand “Rude boys and English Gents, soon after came my second brand “Dual Society”. With lot of trials, mistakes, and winning moments I learned a lot about an industry that I had little knowledge of. My thought process at the time was that I wanted to have fun designing menswear. This industry was tougher than I thought. After the five years, my business partner and I folded the company. I took a year off to figure out what I wanted to do next. But the inkling of fashion stayed with me. Today with all the knowledge and experiences I had in the past as a self-taught, independent fashion designer. I started my own studio again called Fortis Orbis Atelier (in Latin it means Brave New World). Now my approach to fashion is much different than it was five years ago. I hated mass production and doing seasonal clothes. So now I’m a non-seasonal designer, my concept in design is more anti-fashion, one of a kind, and limited-edition designs. I treat my designs as a piece of art. To cut cost I started to make my own patterns and taught myself to hand sew and sew with a machine. I work in my parent’s garage in the summer, and their spare room in the winter at an industrial town called Wilmington. I guess you can call me a guerilla or underground designer. At this moment I’m much happier in creating what I love and sharing to the world my passion. I sell privately, and work with a lot of photographs using my designs for editorials and submitting work in fashion magazines. Getting publish is the goal now, along with expanding my client list and private buyers.

Great, so let’s dig a little deeper into the story – has it been an easy path overall and if not, what were the challenges you’ve had to overcome?
In the beginning it was not a smooth road. I came in the fashion industry wet around the ears. I learned a lot as I went through the process in getting clothing made, and getting buyers interested. The toughest was getting samples made in time for market week. The second toughest is to get buyers to look at your collection. They’ll either love it or hate it. To have an eighteen-piece collection can be a hit or miss. If you don’t make the sells, the money you invested has been wasted. My business partner and I broke even. Meaning the personal money, we spent for the business was covered to pay our studio rent and our vendors. But individually we didn’t get any money to pay each other. So that’s when we brought in an investor and that too was a challenge. Today with Fortis Orbis Atelier I finance and run my brand on my own.

Fortis Orbis Atelier – what should we know? What do you guys do best? What sets you apart from the competition?
Fortis Orbis Atelier was started in treating fashion as an art form, specializing in menswear. My followers and fans are calling me the anti-fashion designer. I shun the standard way of the fashion industries approach. I feel there are other alternatives in getting my brand out there. The proudest of what I do as a brand, is being free in designing what I want and when. Like an artist there is no deadline, when a piece is finish then it’s ready to be shown at my own schedule without doing a whole collection. What sets me apart from others, is that I am an independent designer that’s still underground. That I don’t practice the standard rules of the fashion industry, I guess you can call it a fashion rebel. Most of all are my designs and concepts, having fun designing clothes for the 21st Century. As I always say, “The Future is Now!” As other designers looking back for inspiration I look forward.

What moment in your career do you look back most fondly on?
The many fashion shows I participated in. It brought me lots of exposure and followers. The biggest moment was getting publish in Italian Vogue menswear edition of one of my designs. And getting a write up and publish photos of my designs in the California Apparel News, as an undiscovered talent.

Contact Info:

• Website: http://www.fortisorbisatelier.com
• Phone: 562-760-5535
• Email: [email protected]
• Instagram: fortis_orbis_atelier
• Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/fortisorbisatelier/

Image Credit:
Photographers: Emily Gummig Photography and Hugo Romo

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