Transmission and Savoir-Faire: 2019 highlights at LVMH
LVMH
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© LVMH
The excellence of the LVMH Group’s products and their global appeal are the fruit of unique artisanal and creative métiers. Preserving these time-honored skills and their traditions is thus essential to the Group’s enduring success. Preservation goes hand in hand with an ongoing renewal and vibrant modernity, both equally important to thriving over the long-term. This is why LVMH is deeply committed to long-term support for the skills at its different Maisons, and to ensuring their transmission. This commitment to transmission and the preservation of savoir-faire was once again manifest in multiple initiatives during 2019.
LVMH x La Fabrique Nomade, refuge in craftsmanship
Created in 2016, La Fabrique Nomade introduced a new model of professional inclusion for refugee artisans by helping them continue to exercise their craft in France. LVMH has always been committed to the preservation and transmission of unique savoir-faire and creative métiers that are emblematic of the excellence at its Maisons. United by this love of artisanal craftsmanship, LVMH and the association inaugurated a partnership in 2019, embodied in the vernissage of the Traits d’Union 4 collection, whose theme “Treasure” was chosen by LVMH Group Visual Image Director Faye McLeod. Artisans from La Fabrique Nomade crafted pieces – objects, jewels, clothes – that evoke their personal stories, a memory or a cultural symbol. LVMH is strengthening this partnership with La Fabrique Nomade in 2020 as designers from the Group’s Maisons provide support for the artisans and the creation of the next Traits d’Union collection.
LVMH Creative Expedition at the 34th International Festival of Fashion, Photography and Fashion Accessories in Hyères
The LVMH Group has been a partner of the International Festival of Fashion, Photography and Fashion Accessories in Hyères for the past 21 years. This partnership underscores LVMH’s active commitment to artistic creation and the emergence of new talents, with special focus in 2019 on transmission of savoir-faire and sustainable development as LVMH introduced a special initiative called the LVMH Creative Expedition. The event gave five students on LVMH scholarships at Central Saint Martins as part of the “LVMH & Central Saint Martins Sustainability & Innovation in Luxury / Fostering Creativity” program, and ten creative talents from LVMH Maisons, a chance to discover the universe of LVMH during tours of two emblematic places.
The Creative Expedition also invited the young talents to the Hyères Festival, where the ten designers in the Fashion competition gave them a preview of their collections. They attended a round table on “The Environment as a Creativity Factor” led by LVMH Chief Environmental Officer Alexandre Capelli, with Carole Collet, Director of the Central Saint Martins-LVMH Sustainable Innovation program, and Guillaume Delacroix, founder and CEO of DLX, a PR firm specialized in fashion and fashion-industry related environmental issues.
Promising harvests for 2019 vintage of LVMH Champagne Maisons
As every year, some 5,000 people worked for three weeks to harvest grapes from the estates of Dom Pérignon, Ruinart, Moët & Chandon, Veuve Clicquot, Krug and Mercier, representing a total of 1,700 hectares (17 square kilometers). The atypical year harbors great hopes for the 2019 vintage in Champagne.
The weather differed considerably from the habitual climate of Champagne, with periods of intense heat, late blooming and heat waves. At the end of August, the sugar concentration was twice the expected level, stimulating the maturation process of the grapes.
Vincent Chaperon, Cellar Master of Dom Pérignon, expects “a vintage with moderate yield and very promising quality.” The harvest points to “concentration and richness” and “a certain tension” in the future wines.
Louis Vuitton inaugurates 16th workshop in France at Beaulieu-sur-Layon
Louis Vuitton inaugurated its 16th workshop in France at the beginning of September. Located in Beaulieu-sur-Layon in the Maine-et-Loire region in western France, the workshop’s sober elegance reflects the Maison’s exacting standards of exquisite craftsmanship. The building has been designed for optimal energy consumption with acoustic treatment to minimize noise.
The Beaulieu-sur-Layon site joins the Maison’s other leather goods, accessories and components workshops, reflecting ongoing momentum of job creation and transmission of unique expertise thanks to the Louis Vuitton Ecole des Savoir-Faire.
Created in 2010, the academy enables Louis Vuitton leather goods artisans to enhance their skills throughout their careers. It also welcomes students earning vocational degrees in leather goods craftsmanship from the LVMH Institut des Métiers d’Excellence within the scope of a work-study program.