From Howdy to Ciao

On a Mississippi suburb street, 8-year-old Darren Crisp ’92 laid his bicycle on the pavement and approached a newfound assemblage of concrete, dirt and framework where a familiar vacancy once existed. Like a clue to a mystery, he picked up the hand-drawn floor plans left behind, marveling at the intricate designs of a new home’s production from a pen-and-paper perspective.

In this moment, Crisp found a passion for the process. Even at a young age, he grew fascinated by the idea of creating a masterpiece from the ground up using detailed design and thoughtful planning. And in his hands, he unknowingly held a blueprint that would inspire one of the greatest journeys of his life.
 

Crossroads and Camaraderie

Fast forward 14 years, Crisp graduated high school in Kingwood, Texas—one of the many places his family called home throughout his childhood. With one parent working as a secret service agent and the other in homeland security, the Houston-born, third-generation Aggie was accustomed to travel. However, when mapping out his move for college, Texas ties kept his mind on maroon.
 

“When we got back to Texas, I knew I wanted to attend Texas A&M University,” Crisp said. “I knew I could become an architect if I went there.”

In a fate-changing phone call back to Mississippi, Crisp encouraged his childhood friend, William “Doug” Harmon ’92, to join him on his journey to Aggieland. Without much persuasion, the soon-to-be roommates were bound for Aggie architecture.
 

Changing Lanes

After graduating from Texas A&M, Crisp channeled his newfound insights into his career path. As a competitive cyclist and aspiring architect, he ultimately wanted to pursue architectural work in Italy, but a bicycle racing injury put his dreams on hold.

He instead returned to Mississippi to work in a fabrication shop, where he split his time between architectural design and enjoying the bicycle racing scene. Given the skills and resources at his fingertips, it was at this point that Crisp decided to combine his hobby and handiwork by building his first custom bike frame.
 

“This was 1995, so you didn’t have the internet,” Crisp joked. “I checked out a book from the municipal library and took it back to the shop. My boss knew it was my hobby, so he told me to knock myself out as long as I was ready for work in the morning.”

Merging his passions, he found a unique calling in creating custom bicycle frames and began producing them for friends and local racers. However, as new opportunities arose, this passion remained a pastime while he explored a full-time career in construction.

“I gave myself three years to build a proper welding and design portfolio before getting on a plane to find a job in Italy—and that’s what I did.”

In 1997, Crisp returned to Italy to pursue a career in project management for an Italian fabrication company, where he oversaw production of high-end commercial projects and flagship stores for brands like Prada, Gucci, Louis Vuitton and Dolce & Gabbana.

“I became a liaison between the architects and the clients,” Crisp explained. “They were very skilled at drawing, but they didn’t know how to make it happen—so I would bring their visions to life in an actual fabrication environment and then help install them in various locations around the world.”

Though the position was perfectly suited for his expertise, it brought a new level of demand to his lifestyle. After 10 years of taxing travel from Italy to New York, Hong Kong, Australia and beyond, he felt the need to pump the brakes. As a husband and father of two, he saw value in shifting gears to accommodate a more reasonable work-life balance and recommitting his career to something that has always brought him joy: cycling.

Cycle Breaking

Leaving the hard hat and hardships behind, Crisp drove full speed into establishing Crisp Titanium: his custom bicycle frame building business in Italy. In a self-built shop at his home in Castiglion Fiorentino, his dream career was born from a culmination of experience, skill and lessons he gained along the way.

“When I started Crisp Titanium, I was an American building in Europe—the bicycle hub of the world—so I sold them cheap and faked it until I made it for a while,” he said. “But I knew what I was doing, especially given the mentorship and experiences I’d learned from.”
 

Coming Full Circle

Thirty years after Crisp’s fervent quest from Aggieland to Italy, the script flipped once again. Enamored by her father’s American upbringing, Crisp’s oldest daughter, Matilde, is now chasing her dream of becoming an Aggie herself—ironically, while working at an Italian restaurant in College Station.

“She has a dream, and I’m honoring it,” he said with a smile. “She was born and raised in Italy, so I know her adopted affinity must come from me exposing her to Texas A&M, but I never thought she would really consider it.”

Throughout her childhood, Matilde began latching onto the Aggie culture her father portrayed, especially as she gained more exposure through Crisp’s longstanding connection to the study abroad program in Italy. By her teenage years, Matilde was giving tours of Castiglion Fiorentino and offering tutoring to visiting college students, many of them Aggies.
 

“I knew she loved American culture, but she has amazed me with her innate gift with people,” Crisp said. “She can enter into any American group and fit right in, and I could never do that when I first came to Italy.”

Despite full-ride opportunities to study in Florence, Matilde has a hint of her father’s ambition and strives to follow in his footsteps. After graduating high school from A&M Consolidated High School as a foreign exchange student, Matilde is now on scholarship at Blinn College with goals to transfer to Texas A&M to study architecture. Crisp proudly believes if anyone deserves it, it’s his daughter.

“When we filled out college forms together, they asked for 10 schools she was interested in attending and she only listed one: Texas A&M,” Crisp said. “When she has a goal, she’s all in and she’ll work hard for it. In my eyes, she’s already surpassed everything I’ve done.”

Crisp admits if she’s anything like him, he knows Matilde is likely never turning back from Texas. “There’s a balance in the bittersweet,” Crisp said. “As badly as I want to hold on, the best part is that her ride has just begun."