It was the summer after high-school graduation. Or the summer before his freshman year of college. It was both, or neither, depending on the day. Still living at his parent’s house, Ethan LoCigno came down the stairs and told his parents that he was starting a Shirt Company. It wasn’t a full-fledged shirt company, more so it was a single shirt that he planned to sell [to the masses, of course], with a single word emblazed across the front of it: REAL.

 

It is hard to put the boy in a box; but, if there was a word to sum it up – this was it. Ever the middle child [older brother, Mitchell; younger sister, Anna], Ethan was as charismatic as they come. He was handsome and charming, and he could talk his way into [and out of] pretty much anything. He was passionate about many things – his family, his tight-knit group[s] of friends, music, hockey, skiing, and fishing. But at his very core, Ethan was kind and passionate about his people. He wanted to afford people the luxury that is so hard to come by in this day in age of social media – the luxury of being someone that people could be their REAL self around.

 

 

 

 

 

 

In February of 2019, Ethan lost his battle with depression.
His friends and family wish to carry on his legacy through The Real Project — 

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an awareness initiative focused on normalizing
REAL conversations about mental health.