Mike Oldfield, Alan Parson and Foreigner storm the charts. In the same year, 1982, Italian Mario Antonio Mazzola founded the Checker brand with the aim of tailoring a comfortable and stylish shirt of outstanding quality. To underpin his international claim, the brand was initially to be called Compass. But things turned out differently. On the phone to his lawyer in Germany, Mazzola learns that this brand name is not available. As he was sitting in a cab in New York at the time, he spontaneously asked if the name CHECKER was available. It was free. The brand was born.

And it was obviously the birth of a dream child. Across Europe, the collection launch sparked a run on the cool new shirt with the mother-of-pearl press studs and casual topstitching. In the 80s, there is no one who can escape this trend. The term "it-piece" may not yet exist, but today the CHECKER shirts would certainly be described as such. Quality has always had its price, so parents are begged, grandparents are pleaded with and pocket money is saved until the item hangs in the wardrobe. Or even better: it could be taken out to the trendy clubs, which were still called discos back then.

In the evening when you undress, you casually undo the press studs, or at best someone does it for you. It's a wild time. There are no cell phone photos and social media is still a long way off. "What happens in Vegas, stays in Vegas". You have to be there to experience it. Not virtually and digitally, but for real. Live and in color. Speaking of color. There is hardly a color in which the shirt is not available. Not to mention the cool denims. And while the shirt gets damp while dancing in the evening, the mothers curse while ironing those seams that can't be tamed with the best will in the world. As I said, it was a wild time. However, as with many trendy 80s brands, at some point the zenith is passed. After half a million shirts were sold in high-end boutiques every year, buyers gradually changed their minds. The cool denim shirts became business shirts. Olive becomes white, 2 open buttons on shirts become ties. And Raider becomes Twix.

M.A. Mazzola retires and lets the sun shine on his nose at his new home in Mallorca. Quite nice for a few years. But is that it now? And the calls for these shirts, for this brand and for this lifestyle are not dying down. On the contrary. They are getting louder. So loud that they can even be heard on the distant Spanish island of fashion icon Mazzola. Another person who also hears these calls for the wonderful 80s and the hip looks of this era is Essen-based fashion entrepreneur Jörg Messerschmidt. Together with the Italian, the German custom clothing producer is dreaming of resurrecting the CHECKER brand. The look of the past with contemporary cuts. All in top quality. Something is possible.