Fragrance house

Munsingwear

Munsingwear traces its origins to George D. Munsing’s 1886 move to Minneapolis to produce silk-plated wool underwear and to the Northwestern Knitting Company, founded there in 1887 by Munsing, Frank H. Page, and Edward O. Tuttle. The company adopted the Munsingwear name in 1919 in honor of its founder. Its early identity centered on engineered knit underwear, including a patented one-piece union suit manufactured in the 1890s. In 1955, Munsingwear introduced the Grand Slam golf shirt, marking the beginning of its dedicated golf-polo offering and its first knit golf shirt. Golf later became the brand’s defining modern identity, expressed through the 1960s Action Gusset shirt, the 1970s GS Collar, and continuing golf-apparel development. Ownership changed in the mid-1990s, when Supreme International acquired Munsingwear and Grand Slam; the recorded year is 1995 in one corporate chronology and 1996 in a later filing. In 2021, Descente Japan introduced Munsingwear Grand-Slam and Original Penguin by Munsingwear in Japan as heritage extensions, and in 2025 Descente became a wholly owned subsidiary of ITOCHU Corporation while Munsingwear entered a growth-oriented joint venture in China.