Aspen Peak - Niche Media - Aspen living at its peak
Issue link: http://www.ifoldsflip.com/i/417540
GLOBAL GOODS… AND THE VICUÑA Pier Luigi's intuitive way of uncovering and work- ing with raw materials has been the driving force of his career. Indeed, he cites "a big group of peo- ple"—approximately 65 —who are trained to take the raw material from fiber to production, "techni- cians for spinning, wheeling, manufacturing; they learn from me," he says. But Pier Luigi himself can be found, year after year, leading international trips to uncover new materials. He travels with a small circle of two to three trusted researchers and prefers to be hands-on. His wanderlust for textile discovery and improvement may be his biggest passion; even his yacht My Song can't compete. "I was in charge of purchasing raw materials since the beginning of my career," he explains. "I received from my father a very good base; I was already working with high- quality fabrics. But it's important that somebody who wants to judge new products has a deep knowledge of the raw mate- rial. We try to push the natural raw material [to] the highest level of performance. I like to go in deep. I want to know the feeling [of the material] and what is really happening [in the region]." Preceding his latest revelation in f lower power was the company's establishment of the Dr. Franco Loro Piana (named after the founder's nephew) private nature preserve in Peru. Much of the fabric used for the brand's most coveted pieces comes from the vicuña, a South American relative of the llama, which has been rescued from extinc- tion. The vicuña is a small Andean camelid, coined the "Queen of the Andes." Its coat is so rare that it was protected by the Incas and only worn by the Incan emperor and his family. Word of this exquisite fiber, however, traveled quickly, and eventually Spanish conquistadors hunted the animal to near extinction. The vicuña became endangered as poaching continued; by the 1960s only 5,000 remained. Loro Piana began championing the species in the '80s, working with local governments to safeguard the animal, and by 2008, it officially established the Dr. Franco Loro Piana Reserva. Today, the vicuña head count is approximately 180,000, and the number of vicuña on the reserve has doubled since its incep- tion, according to company claims. Furthermore, just last year, Loro Piana expanded its vicuña efforts to Argentina, acquiring 60 percent of Sanin SA, an Argentine company with rights to shear wild vicuña. Loro Piana is currently the top pro- ducer of vicuña, considered the finest fiber that can be legally shorn from an adult animal. Only 12.5 to 13 microns thick, the resulting wool is incomparable in softness and quality. A NEW LEVEL OF LUXURY? W hen at home in It a ly, Pier Luig i dr ives a Tesla The stalk of the lotus flower (above) produces a strong and lightweight fiber that is harvested and extracted by hand (shown here) for use in the exclusive Lotus Flower jacket (right). a nd t a kes pr ide in being a fa mily ma n. But when he's dr iv ing business—a k in to how he nav igates t he sea dur ing race day aboa rd t he Rainbow—he's highly st rateg ic. To some, t he merger of Loro Pia na w it h LV M H, which a lso ow ns prest ig ious bra nds such as Veuve Clicquot , TAG Heuer, Dom Pér ig non, Céline, Loewe, a nd Givenchy, was a sur pr ising move. For Pier Luig i, however, it made per fect sense. "The group has the know-how—the system, management, and the potential—to continue and develop the strateg y Loro Piana already put in place," he says. LVMH is also a committed advo- cate of environmental protection and a member of the United Nations Global Compact, providing further evidence that it was a good fit for the fam- ily-run business. An initiative launched in 2003 by Kofi Annan, [then] secretary-general of the U.N., the UNGC requires its signatories to apply and promote 10 principles in the field of human rights, labor, and the environment. "Quality is the prime character of everything we do," Pier Luigi notes. "We've built a conscious- ness that high quality is related to natural fibers." By quality he refers to unparalleled texture, color, refinement—and the avoidance of a detrimental effect on the environment. "If you put a jacket of wool under the dirt, it will die, like a sheep that dies in the grass. The nylon jacket never dies." On t he day we set for t h on t he Rainbow, despite best ef for t s, t he crew d id n't cross t he f i n- ish l i ne f i rst ( but t he tea m went on to w i n second place overa l l i n Div ision A). Yet a s we d isem- ba rked a nd w ished P ier Lu ig i good luck du r i ng t he ensu i ng regat t a race days, he w i n ked a nd sa id, "We may not have won today… but we're cer t a i n ly t he best d ressed." 316 S. Galena St., 970-544-0502; loropiana .com AP aspenpeak-magazine.com 187