FINEST LUXURY CLOTHS: GUANASHINA
Following on from my post about Dormeuil Jade I thought I would talk today about the Daddy of luxury cloths, the apex of luxury: Guanashina.
Heres what Dormeuil has to say about there offering:
Dormeuil are proud to announce, after many years of research, combined with travel to distant lands in search of the most exotic fibres, a completely new concept in luxury fabric – Guanashina. Guanashina – a blend of three precious and rare fibres expressing the ultimate essence of luxury. Once in a lifetime, a cloth is created which is so unique, so inimitable, so peerless, that it transcends any superlative used to describe it. Never in the history of luxury fabrics has such a creation ever been contemplated, let alone achieved. The story of the three fibres is, in itself, a tale encompassing traditions and cultures, from the uplands of Ladakh on the Roof of the World in northern India, to the deserts of inner Mongolia, and the Andes Mountains of Peru. -Kid Pashmina – fleece exclusively from the underbelly of the kid Pashmina goat – jealously guarded by the Moguls for its silky softness and reserved for members of the Royal Family. Dark tales are told of those who ignored the warning. -Baby Cashmere – The finest goats are bred only in inner Mongolia. The ancient Chinese guarded their secret well - to achieve the maximum length of fibre the baby animal is combed only once for its soft under-fleece when it is a year and a half old. -Guanaco – since time immemorial used for coronation robes of the Royal Incas symbolising their majesty and power. A member of the llama family, today the Guanaco is herded by nomads on the high plateaux of the Andes Mountains. Only the hair of the young animal – Chulengo – is selected. These, then, are the elements of Guanashina. Combine the elements with fine clothmakers’ skills, skills honed to perfection over centuries of practice in England, and “the most luxurious cloth in the world” – Guanashina. – is created. A cloth of unsurpassed natural beauty, suppleness, and warmth. Although great care is taken to obtain the purest of raw materials, only about 30% of the fibres will be selected for their length and fineness. This judicious selection means that only fabric, for less than two hundred garments world wide, will be produced.
Wow. Its going to be hard for me to follow all that.
I remember when I was working at one of my old firms. I lobbied Dormeuil to give me samples of Guanashina for the store. I was always getting reporters and clients asking me how much is your most expensive suit? (quite vulgar yes). I used to delight in pulling out the Guanashina box and telling them that a suit in one of these would cost them $25000 the look on there faces was priceless. A flamboyant Music Mogul even spat out his champaign after selecting it and hearing the price.
In fairness though the price point is not the thing to be talking about with this cloth. Technically we are talking about the finest produced fabric in the world. Ever.
I am sure people like Genghis Khan, Louis XIV and the Inca Kings would have commissioned a cloth like this if they had the technology and resources. Really Guanashina is at the cutting edge in terms of luxury cloths right now and when your talking in those terms the price point is understandable.
The cloth itself is truly amazing. The samples are presented in an elaborate case and mounted on cards. It is a super 200s quality and the patterns and colors are extremely fine and tight. Even on a small swatch scale the fabric has an almost magical quality. It is so fine and soft I think that light wear would damage the finish very easily but then again if you have a suit made in one of these you probably have a pretty big wardrobe.
In summary I think this is truly the most technically brilliant luxury cloth. Does this mean it is the best cloth? Is the most expensive bottle of wine the best? I don't think so. Its really about what you want in a cloth and what you want it to do. As I have talked about before my favorite luxury cloth is Mohair Tonik, I wouldn't think someone was out of their mind for saying their favorite cloth was Dormeuil royal 12 or Loro piana Tasmanian. There are so many great cloths made by Holland and Sherry, Dormeuil and Loro Piana that separating the wheat from the chaff is not a fair analogy. Rather its more like comparing the top sprinters in the world, the difference between them is measured in fractions of a second. Or in the case of comparing quite different cloths another way of looking at it is comparing Heavy weight boxers to bantam weights the classification doesn't mean one boxer is superior to another. I would think it was crazy for example to compare quality of a cotton suit to a silk.
A David Reeves suit in Dormeuil Guanashina would really have to be made in 6000 stitches Bespoke and would start at $15000.
In my next post about Luxury cloths I will be talking about Loro Piana Vicuna.
