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IE Business School Prizes for Sustainability in the Premium and Luxury Sectors

Petit h, Simone Cipriani, Meche Correa, Campi Ya Kanzi, Gudrun & Gudrun, Looptworks, Kahina Giving Beauty, Winners or IE Prizes for Sustainable Luxury.

Petit h, Simone Cipriani and Meche Correa were given honorary mentions as established companies within the IE Awards for Sustainability in the Premium and Luxury Sectors. The companies awarded prizes at this year’s edition, held in IE’s Paper Pavilion, designed by 2014 Pritzker Prize winner Shigeru Ban, were Campi Ya Kanzi (Tourism, hotels and hospitality); Gudrun & Gudrun (Apparel and accessories); Looptworks (Smart luxury) and Kahina Giving Beauty (Cosmetics). The IE Awards for Sustainability in the Premium and Luxury Sectors are an annual recognition of the ability of new generations of entrepreneurs to innovate and integrate in their strategies the values of sustainability and responsibility. This year’s edition has included for the first time the category of Smart Luxury.

The overriding objective of the awards, which are run jointly by IE Business School (Madrid) and Fundación de Estudios e Investigaciones Superiores (Buenos Aires), is to afford recognition of best commercial practices, strategies and innovation in the activities of sectors related to sustainability in the luxury and premium industry.

The winners of this sixth edition of the IE Awards for Sustainability in the Premium and Luxury Sectors are leaders that transform, inspire, provide intellectual incentives and are concerned about people and the environment. Such leadership and inspiration is crucial in moving toward sustainability in the luxury sector, said Miguel Ángel Gardetti, director and founder of the IE Awards for Sustainability in the Premium and Luxury Sectors.

This year’s awards in the four categories were:

-       Apparel and accessories. The winner is Faroe Islands-based company Gudrun & Gudrun. Set up by two women from the Faroe Islands, the company makes all its knitwear by hand. Its clothes meet the standards of customers worried about others, about the environment, about our shared natural resources, and who also wish to look fasionable.

-        Cosmetics. The winner is Kahina Giving Beauty, a company that makes premium organic skincare products. Kahina Giving Beauty’s mission is to provide the highest-quality products for the face and body while conserving and protecting the natural, human and cultural resources behind the brand.

-        Tourism, hotels and hospitality. The winner is Campi Ya Kanzi. This lodge is a luxury safari accommodation in the Tsavo savannah in southern Kenya, part of a Masai reserve of more than 113,000 hectares owned by the Masai community, meaning that part of the profits go directly to tribe members. All construction uses local materials.

-        Smart luxury. The winner is Looptworks, a Portland, Oregon-based company that uses recycled material to make attractive and useful things for daily life. It is recognized as a pioneer for its environmental approach to the design and production of their goods that is reflected in the company’s motto: use less, make more.

Alongside these prizes, three honorary mentions go out to already established companies:

-        A Lifetime contribution toward sustainable luxury development award went to Petit h and to Pascale Mussard. Petit h was set up in 2009 by philosopher Pascale Mussard, the creative director at Hermès and a member of the sixth generation of the family that created the celebrated brand. Petit h gives new life to  Hermès offcuts and defective pieces that would otherwise be thrown away, creating products such as lampshade, seats, decorative objects or jewelry, all of them unique or limited series.

-        The Latin American sustainable luxury prize has gone this year to Peruvian designer and fashion ambassador Meche Correa, who best represents the strength of the millenarian creativity and art of her country. Meche Correa works with mostly female artisans from Cusco, Ayacucho, Huancayo, Lima, Cajamarca, as well as rural areas in the Amazon Basin who make her jewelry line made from bone and cow horn. Correa set the company up to provide work to women in urban areas.

- This year’s awards also include Recognition to Best Contribution in Raising Awareness, which acknowledges the career of Simone Cipriani, the founder of the Ethical Fashion Initiative. Cipriani oversees the marketing and incubation of creative micro-businesses in marginalized communities in Africa and Haiti. Her initiative was launched in Nairobi through alliances with designers such as Vivienne Westwood and Stella McCartney, among others.

“The IE Awards for Sustainability in Premium and Luxury Sectors identify and give visibility to the pioneers of responsible innovation in the Prestige sector. From places as diverse as New York, the Faroe Islands in Denmark, or France, these entrepreneurs are looking for new sustainable business models for companies related to hotels, beauty products, apparel  and accessories,” said María Eugenia Girón.

This year’s event was attended by Santiago Íñiguez, president of IE University and Dean of IE Business School; María Eugenia Girón, executive director of the awards, as well as of the Premium Market Observatory and IE and Mastercard’s Prestige Products. Miguel Ángel Gardetti, director of the Center for the Study of Sustainable Luxury and president and founder of the Sustainable Luxury Prize.

The opening address of this year’s edition of the awards was made by Santiago Íñiguez, President of IE University and Dean of IE Business School, accompanied by María Eugenia Girón, Director of the IE/Mastercard Observatory on Premium and Prestige Markets and Executive Director of the awards, and Miguel Ángel Gardetti, Director of the Center for Studies for Sustainable Luxury, and President and Founder of the Sustainable Luxury Prize.

Also attending the event was Enrique Valero, director general of Abadía Retuerta, who handed Katherine L’Heureux, the founder of Kahina Giving Beauty, her prize. Ovidio Egido, director general of MasterCard gave Pio Cabanillas, co-founder of Campi Ya Kanzi, his prize. Alicia Parro, director of the Conde Naste Group’s Glamour magazine, gave Scott Hamlin, founder of Looptworks; while Raúl González, CEO of Barceló Hotels, gave Christian Nagata, president of Gudrun and Gudrun; while Miguel Ángel Gardetti, director and founder of the IE Awards for Sustainability in the Premium and Luxury Sectors, gave Meche Correa her prize. In turn, María Eugenia Girón, director of the Premium Market Observatory and IE and Mastercard’s Prestige Products, as well as being executive director of the prizes, handed over the recognition award to Simone Cipriani, while Santiago Íñiguez, president of IE University and Dean of IE Businss School gave Pascale Mussard of Petit h her prize.

In the words of Ovidio Egido, the director general of Mastercard Spain, “for Mastercard it is a pleasure to be present at this award ceremony, which has become a benchmark event. Mastercard, as an expert in consumer habits, believes it is essential to be able to offer consumers a greater variety of personalized services and innovative products, characteristic of those winning today’s awards.”

The awards ceremony is one of the activities organized annually by the IE AND MASTERCARD PREMIUM AND PRESTIGE OBSERVATORY and that this year featured, the day before the event, a round table discussion that looked at digital and sustainable transformation in the premium and luxury sector, under the heading “Exploring the links between technology and responsible innovation in premium and luxury”, moderated by María Eugenia Girón, and attended by Scott Hamlin, co-founder of Looptworks; Kavita Parmar, founder of the IOU Project; Pepita; co-founder of We are Knitters; Conchita Galdón, director of Area 31, and Alicia Parro, editor of Glamour España magazine.

During the debate, María Eugenia Girón pointed out that “technology provides for the most intelligent market solutions”. Conchita Galdón said that technology and its relationship with luxury brands is a natural way of moving away from a linear production system toward a more circular economy in which we can share objects and in which ownership is no longer so important. She also added that the most important ingredients for a company’s success are technology, science, and knowledge.

Kavita Parmar of the IOU Project called for responsible consumption and for dialogue, a conversation between buyer and manufacturer. Pepita of We are Knitters said that technology is part of her DNA and that her company has taken advantage of the use of technology, while highlighting the sense of satisfaction we feel when we make something with our own hands. Scott Hamlin of Looptworks discussed the issue of global waste, not just during production but as consumers. This prompted him to found his business. Hamlin commented on the importance of being able to use design to create something from waste and to create things that lengthened the life of these materials.

Alicia Parro of Glamour magazine highlighted how information has gradually changed consumer behavior, introducing the concept of sustainability into the equation. For the average consumer it is necessary to go a step further and to make sure that all goods carried sustainability labels. She also asked what would be the impact of more people consuming less and more responsibly.

This year’s event also saw the presentation of Sustainable Luxury and Social Entrepreneurship, by Miguel Ángel Gardetti and María Eugenia Girón. The event was attended by sustainable pioneers such as Alan Frampton, the British creator of CRED, along with Gudrun Rogvadottir and Gudrun Ludvig, the founders of Gudrun & Gudrun in the Faroe Isles.

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