Wynn Magazine - Las Vegas
Issue link: http://www.ifoldsflip.com/i/660157
48 PhotograPhy by tIZIaNa FabI/aFP/get t y Images (bags IN wINdow); VeNturellI/ wIreImage (model wIth bag); barbara KraFt (guccI store; brIoNI store) employing over 45,000 people in Italy alone." This is in part because "Made in Italy" is not just a label. It's a law. In 2009, Italy passed one of the world's strictest label- ing regulations for domestically produced goods. The full rules for "Made in Italy" certification are available at madeinitaly.org, but they boil down to this: The product must be manufactured entirely within Italy to the compa- ny's exclusive designs, using Italian workers, traditional methods, and grade-A natural materials, and in hygienic and safe working conditions. This devotion to quality and custom has paid off: A 2013 survey of 10,000 luxury con- sumers in 10 countries by the Boston Consulting Group found that knowing an item was made in Italy generated the highest level of consumer confidence in the categories of clothing, accessories, and jewelry, and the second-high- est in watches (after Switzerland) and cars (after Germany). Jay Lipe, a senior lecturer at the University of Minnesota's Carlson School of Management, who teaches an advanced course in Rome and Florence called "Made in Italy" Brand Management, says the label conjures in the consumer's mind "this idea of a certain quality of the raw materials, of an element of craftsmanship, and of a skilled artisan who is involved in the final processing." It's no wonder that Italian brands celebrate their Italianness. In 2011, Gucci even opened a museum and café in a stately palazzo that had been, appropriately enough, the seat of Florence's medieval merchant guilds. Overlooking the Palazzo Vecchio on bustling Piazza della Signoria— "the living room of Florence"—this was where the city's powerful cloth importers, wool manufacturers, furriers, and silk weavers once held sway. The guilds' timeworn stone crests are now on display in the bookshop, The "Made in iTaly" TreaTMenT in las Vegas In February of 1951, a Florentine antiques and art dealer named Giovanni Battista Giorgini took it upon himself to make Italian clothing fashionable—and exportable—by inviting buyers from the biggest North American companies to swing by his Florence villa after the annual Paris runway season. As part of the soirée, Giorgini mounted Italy's very first fashion show, featuring, among others, the designs of a local marchese named Emilio Pucci. The gamble paid off, orders poured in to local ateliers, and "Made in Italy" became all the rage. In 1952, the event moved into the Pitti Palace, where the Roman fashion house Brioni hosted another first: a men's fashion show. Since then, Florence's annual fashion parade has introduced such designers as Valentino and Armani to the world, and today's Pitti Immagine calendar includes half a dozen annual fashion shows in Florence's Renaissance-era Fortezza del Basso. But fans no longer have to make the pilgrimage to Italy to get a bespoke Brioni Su Misura suit like the one Daniel Craig wore in Casino Royale. The Brioni boutique at Wynn is the only one in the US to offer the brand's Miror technology, a kind of virtual closet in which a computerized 3-D tailoring system allows clients to choose from among 1,500 fabrics and 8 million styling combinations. While the suits may take shape in Vegas, this is still a "Made in Italy" experience: All Brioni master tailors are trained at the company's own tailoring school in the Abruzzo moun- tains, where they study no fewer than 220 steps of workmanship, from drawing and cutting to the proper way to iron. above: A Gucci bag display at the Gucci Museum in Florence, and a model walking the runway during Gucci's show for Milan Fashion Week, Spring/ Summer 2016. below: The Gucci store at Wynn Macau. top right: The Brioni store at Wynn Las Vegas.