We had the chance to open the doors of one of the most famous fabric manufacturers in the world, accompanied by Olivier Cothenet, founder of the Office Artist brand.
First of all, who is Olivier Cothenet?
Olivier Cothenet on the left and Silvio Albini on the right, in the Thomas Masson archives.
Olivier Cothenet created the Office Artist shirt brand, which I invite you to discover. He wanted to create a brand of shirts for young professionals who like to go to work in beautiful clothes (he simply wants to offer workers effective formal shirts, with a beautiful style, made in beautiful fabrics).
I found it very interesting to share this short stay in Italy with an entrepreneur who makes this product (fabric) his core business (on top of that, he makes great valves).
A test of the brand can be found in the second part of this article.
Albini fabric... in Albino
Assembling the warp and weft on a loom in the historic Albini factory.
After visiting the Cerruti spinning mill in Biella , it was important for us to introduce you to the world of shirts and above all: what is a good fabric? How do we produce it? What's the point of buying beautiful fabric?
Before answering these questions, a little history is in order. Albini is a family business (like many Italian companies) founded in 1876 in Albino, a few kilometers from Bergamo.
Bergamo which is a medieval fortified town. Bring your sweetheart there, she will appreciate it.
Since its creation, the head office has remained the same, equipped, year after year, with the best technologies.
At the time, the Albini family settled in Bergamo for 2 main reasons:
- The know-how,
- Abundance of quality water (important for producing beautiful fabric).
Modern buildings mixed with old ones at the Albini head office.
Today Silvio Albini (5th generation of the founding family) runs the group with his brothers: Fabio, Andrea and Stefano. We clearly feel this Italian industrial mentality united with the family. Albini is to Italian textiles, what Barilla is to the food industry, Fiat to automobiles and Beretta to… firearms. The 5th generation is truly focused on creation because every 6 months, Albini renews its collections (colors, design, products, finishes, etc.).
Their goal is to never stop developing in order to be able to respond to ever more demanding demand and stay in the race with emerging markets. According to Silvio Albini: “ It’s up to us to create quality. We must not let ourselves be guided by the Chinese, Turkish, Indian markets .”
The group also deploys extensively abroad, with agents present in more than 60 countries. Customer demands are clearly different depending on countries and cultures (Silvio Albini will tell us about this in his interview).
Where does Albini cotton come from?
Egyptian cotton field belonging to Albini.
According to Albini, traditional cotton sourcing is not sufficient to produce a quality shirt. The final fabric depends too much on the initial quality of the cotton. They therefore chose a radical but effective solution: controlling production from A to Z.
This makes Albini a fully integrated group, from growing cotton to marketing the fabric .
The group produces 3 types of cotton (two Egyptian and Caribbean) and linen (Norman). All harvests are done by hand, in cotton bags so as not to pollute the fibers or risk tearing them.
Cotton is like wine, depending on its treatment or the setting in which it grows, it will give a different fiber. So why does Albini own 3 different cotton farms? Maybe this will enlighten you:
- Giza 45 cotton : Giza 45 is grown east of the Nile. It represents only 0.4% of global cotton production. This region enjoys an ideal climate for growing cotton (hot days and cool nights). The cotton fibers harvested are very fine: 2.80 microns. Despite the fineness of the fiber, it remains extremely resistant. This cotton will make up the best fabrics of the group.
- Giza 87 cotton : Like 45, it is grown along the Nile. Its particularity is its softness which lasts, which lasts. The Albini group promises almost non-existent degradation wash after wash. Basically, if you want a very soft shirt that doesn't move, you need Giza 87. It is also known for its natural shine.
- Sea Island cotton (Caribbean) : It represents 0.0004% of world cotton production. Its main feature is its 39mm fiber length (which is huge). It is also very soft and durable.
Each cotton has its specificity and meets a very specific need.
Albini's brands
Albini is today 4 very distinct brands, which respond to 4 very different markets:
- Albini : Specializing in sophisticated, refined fabrics that play on textures for a simple and effective style.
- Thomas Mas on : You have probably already heard this brand which is a reference among tailors. It is the oldest house that Albini owns today (1796). English house for an English style, the fabrics offered by Thomas Mason are therefore elegant but also more extravagant. We find strong colors and stripes for example.
- Albiate : Milanese house acquired in 2000 by the Albini family and which responds to requests for a more casual style. We therefore find denim, jacquard, and fabrics for sports clothing such as polo shirts.
- David & John Anderson : This is the top of the pyramid. If you want to acquire the most prestigious fabric in the world, this is the place to stop. Indeed, for this house, only the best cottons are selected (note from Benoit: I had the opportunity to touch David & John Anderson fabrics, they are indeed the most beautiful cotton fabrics that I have seen: the silkiness of the material is surreal) .
Cotton titration
To fully understand what a high quality fabric is, I will quickly explain to you what the thread number or thread count corresponds to: 120, 120/2, 140/2…
The first number is the number of 840 yard (768.1 m) skeins contained in one pound (453.6 g) of cotton. For your information, a skein is an assembly of twisted yarn:
This is a skein!
Let's take a Thomas Mason 140/2 fabric:
140 x 768.1m = 107,534m of thread in 453.6g. In this logic, the higher the title, the finer the fabric will be. The /2 corresponds to “double twist” which means that 2 threads are twisted to make one (a bit like your 2 in 1 laundry detergent). This allows the thread to be more solid and regular.
To give you a concrete example, D&J Anderson offers a fabric called Diamond Jubilee in 330/4 (which gives us 330 x 768.1m = 253,473m, multiplied by 4 threads twisted together). It is the most prestigious fabric of the Albini group. It's a fabric that also wrinkles very quickly, but that doesn't scare purists.
To sum up :
- 4 brands (Albini, Thomas Masson, J&D Anderson, Albiate).
- 20,000 types of fabrics produced.
- 8 factories (each specialized in the production chain).
- 1,300 employees (including 700 in Italy).
- 14 million meters of fabric produced each year.
Enough talking, I now suggest you take a tour of the historic factory located in Albino, to fully understand the stages of producing a fabric.
Finally, we had the chance to meet Silvio Albini, president of the group. He tells us how Albini was able to face the crisis and resist emerging markets. He also gives us his opinion on men's purchases, who are focusing more and more on quality (do you recognize yourself?).
If you want more information, you can go to albinigroup.com .
Now let's see how Olivier Cothenet from Office Artist uses these fabrics...
Testing the Office Artist CDG shirt
The range of Office Artist shirts is simple and effective, they are above all dress shirts to wear with jackets, suits or ties, although the brand's lookbook shows that it is possible to place these shirts in much more daring outfits. The advantage of such a clear offer is that it is impossible to go wrong, because the colors are very wearable, they are good examples of basics to have if you wear shirts very often.
So I opted for a thin blue striped shirt which, along with the white shirt and the pale blue shirt, is a staple of an elegant wardrobe.
First impression: everything is clean and well done. As for the cut, nothing to complain about, it's fitted without being excessive. In this regard, the brand's size guide is very well done, you should have no difficulty choosing your size . As someone who has fairly long arms, I am delighted to see that they are not too short on me.
This photo taken from the brand's eshop gives a very precise overview of the cut of the shirts: fitted without ever molding the bust.
The collar is quite classic. With a height of 6 cm, it is in tune with the times, neither too small nor too large. If we compare it to the Col de Hast , it is a bit more formal because it is less flared, but here we enter into purist debates...
We see here that the collar holds very well without a tie, there is nothing to complain about. In this photo I am wearing a Confident jacket .
The collar of the shirt with a tie. You see that we are sticking with a simple and elegant collar design. The tie is a Howard's , a superb brand created by an enthusiast (article coming soon).
In terms of finishes, we stick to classic things. No reinforcement swallows, but the new shirts have the buttons sewn in zampa di gallina and the seams are perfectly executed.
The buttons are sewn crosswise. Although they are plastic, they are absolutely not cheap . The buttonhole seams are also very neat.
No English seam here, but the double seam is very well done, because the fabric hardly curls between the two seams.
Who is Office Artist for?
Like Hast, the offer is clear and effective. The big strong point of Office Artist is clearly the use of fabrics from the Albini group , which are usually only found on more expensive shirts. If you are a big consumer of shirts, this is a very interesting alternative at an affordable price.
Important : the brand recently opened its store, at 3 rue Coëtlogon in Paris, don't hesitate to take a look. Olivier is a jovial man but above all, he gives very good advice and knows his products perfectly.
Go here if you like folders and typewriters that still work (yes, there really is one).
