K-Way Unveils America’s Cup Uniforms for French Challenger Orient Express
The brand is putting uniforms, and lifestyle gear, up for sale, too.
MILAN – K-Way is ready to set sail and gain its slice of visibility in the 37th edition of the America's Cup.
The French brand synonymous with its signature packable windbreaker is unveiling the official uniforms — technical regatta gear and leisurewear — it designed and produced for the Société Nautique de Saint-Tropez crew of French challenger Orient Express Racing Team.
K-Way was revealed last year as the official supplier of the team, a partnership that extends to the women's and junior's squads.
“The project was one-and-a-half years in the making, and we're now almost ready to set sail,” said Lorenzo Boglione, senior vice president of K-Way's parent company BasicNet Group.
The uniforms will make their public debut on May 22 when the Orient Express team will christen its sailboat in Barcelona. The crew's lead skipper, Quentin Delapierre, has been a K-Way brand ambassador since 2023.
“K-Way is a French brand aimed at the outdoors, intended for protection from [adverse] weather conditions. Sailing is just the ideal place for us to be seen,” he said. “There's nothing more aspirational than the America's Cup for a brand that fits in that universe.”
The performance-driven, technical lineup includes jackets, fleeces, pants and shorts with breathable and waterproof qualities, available in dark blue and beige colorways. K-Way's signature “Claude” is reinvented in a dark blue LeVrai 3.0 fabric and is poised to be used during the competitions. Backpacks and duffel bags crafted from laser-cut waterproof materials complement the lineup.
“Our greatest contribution has been to develop a performance-heavy collection. Compared to past America's Cup regattas, [the most recent ones] have turned into extreme sport for the speed of the boats,” Boglione said.
Each garment bears the K-Way logo, as well as that of Orient Express, the America's Cup and other sponsors of the French team, which include Accor and Accor Live Limitless, L'Oréal and Alpine, among others.
The 37th edition of the America's Cup — often described as the Formula 1 of the sea — is set to take place in Barcelona between Aug. 22 and Oct. 27. Louis Vuitton is again the title partner of the event and is once again organizing the Louis Vuitton Cup.
Five challengers in the Louis Vuitton
Cup regattas — Ineos Britannia, Alinghi
Red Bull Racing, Luna Rossa Prada Pirelli, NYYC American Magic and Orient Express Racing — will battle it out on the water to win the right to face off against defender Emirates Team New Zealand for the Louis Vuitton 37th America's Cup Barcelona.
Riding on the tie-up, K-Way is debuting a summer capsule collection comprising the racing line to be worn by sailing aficionados and a lifestyle section, largely with a unisex bent.
The latter includes T-shirts, polo shirts, pants and shorts in technical fabrics, quick-drying swimsuits, as well as accessories such as headwear in dark blue, black, beige, white, or yellow. The collection hits K-Way's flagships and e-commerce on Monday.
The collection retails between 180 and 800 euros for the technical component and between 60 and 240 euros for the lifestyle section.
A pop-up shop selling the capsule collection will be unveiled in Barcelona during the summer as regattas start.
Over the past 10 years, Boglione contended, K-Way's heritage link with sports has been underdeveloped. “Today we think this is an important pillar of brand representation,” he said.
The company has over the past few years named a diverse group of brand ambassadors from the sports and adjacent worlds, including Italian surfer Leonardo Fioravanti; Dalapierre; ocean sailor Ambrogio Beccaria, as well as environmental activist Titouan Bernicot, the founder of Coral Gardeners, a nonprofit organization based in Mo'orea, an island in French Polynesia, that is committed to preserving local and international reefs.
Boglione said that the Orient Express tie-up falls within the broader K-Way strategy of elevating its awareness and positioning.
Since it acquired K-Way in 2004, Italybased BasicNet worked on fine-tuning the product offering; has forged links with designer brands including Saint Laurent, Fendi, Comme des Garçons Play, No. 21 and Dsquared2, among others, and introduced a runway collection, which Boglione usually bills as an experimental ground for the brand's creative team. It has also kicked off art partnerships and activations at Art Basel in Miami and Artissima in Turin, Italy.
K-Way was founded by Leon Claude Duhamel in 1965 in Paris. Its parent company BasicNet group is also home to the Kappa, Robe di Kappa, Jesus Jeans, Superga, Sabelt, Briko and Sebago brands.