Founded in 1978, well before the keywords “quiet luxury” or “stealth wealth” were trending, the Italian fashion house exemplifies this aesthetic with its commitment to ethical and sustainable production practices, and its sophisticated designs. Its success has been, similarly, stealthy: Brunello Cucinelli ended the 2022 financial year with €919.5 million (US$1.01 billion) in sales, a 29.1 per cent increase compared to the previous year.

The company’s growth was spread across the globe, with the Americas growing by 42.9 per cent, Europe by 15.8 per cent and Asia by 56 per cent. Looking at the mainland China market alone, where the ultra-rich’s preference for uber exclusivity and superior quality has grown, Cucinelli’s business experienced remarkable eight-fold growth from 2011 to 2020, with revenue increasing from US$7.4 million to US$61.7 million.

Tatler sat down with Carolina Cucinelli, the co-president and co-creative director of the Perugia-based fashion company, in the newly opened flagship Casa Cucinelli on Queen’s Road Central in Hong Kong. “It’s a beautiful feeling to see a city full of positive energy and young people [who are] very meticulous about taking care of the details [of the look they wear],” says the founder’s daughter, who was sporting a tailored ivory white suit, an effortless demonstration of the quiet luxury look. “For the market, this is a very strong trend. But this is the identity of the brand: if you work with very high-quality materials, it’s important to create garments [meant to last] for a long time, not only for one season.

“What luxury is is exclusivity. [Everyone can access fashion] yet luxury is something that you know is made with a very high quality of craftsmanship and materials,” Cucinelli says. “And it’s made for you, it’s exclusive and personal.” Known for making 100 per cent of its products in Italy, Brunello Cucinelli’s roots are in Solomeo, a small village near Assisi in Italy’s Umbria region. The headquarters are in a beautiful, 14th-century castle which houses the company’s offices and showrooms for more than 800 employees; as well as a publicly accessible theatre, amphitheatre, library and gymnasium, transforming the hamlet into a place for art and culture.

There’s another important ingredient in luxury. “People don’t have much time—I think the most exclusive thing is to have time. Our artisans dedicate time to [making each garment]—it’s not something [created] in a rush.” Sixty per cent of Brunello Cucinelli’s garments are made by hand; the famous handmade sweater, meticulously woven from five or six types of yarn, takes 30 to 40 hours of work by an artisan. And this time costs money, with a knitted cardigan costing up to US$7,000—but, as Cucinelli puts it, “When you buy a garment from the Brunello Cucinelli collections, you also buy little pieces of our story, of our artisans.”

Carolina and her sister Camilla—who also works for the family business, as co-head of the women’s style office—grew up spending afternoons after school with the artisans, learning how to sew and make knitwear. “It was a big family growing up. It was
a very intensive childhood in a beautiful way,” she tells Tatler. “There were always people helping each other— this is one of the most important lessons [that I’ve learnt]: to take care of other people. Nobody is alone.” 

This nurturing setting was just one reason Cucinelli decided to join the company. She has been passionate about art since childhood, and studied it in high school, alongside design courses. “At the end of high school, my father said, ‘Well, what do you want now?’” she recalls. “[I wanted to apply to] university to study fashion and he said, ‘Why don’t you join the company for one year and see what happens?’ Now I have worked in the company for 13 years.”

Her father is as well- known as a humanist as he is a designer. The company’s founder, who recently added the Neiman Marcus Award for Distinguished Service in the Field of Fashion to his long list of achievements, believes in running a sustainable business that values the environment, its people and the community, an approach he describes as “human sustainability and humanistic capitalism”. Born into a peasant family, he wanted to make a difference when he started his knitwear empire: when it came to the profits from his cashmere knitwear for women, he wanted to take ethics, dignity and morals into consideration. This vision is realised via the company’’s commitment to ethical and sustainable production practices, its support for local on preserving traditional artisanal techniques and its efforts in revitalising the village where it’s based. 

If you visit the main website, you’ll quickly realise that there isn’t a single product on display, in tribute to the house’s culture and ideology. “The brand is very well known for putting the philosophy before the clothes. If you want to be a part of a community, it is because this community reflects your values,” says Cucinelli, “and I think it’s important to speak about this story, [in a way that appeals to] the younger generation and attract them with the philosophy.”

Given the company’s success, it is clear something in that philosophy is working, and the brand is set to grow. Following its first-ever collaboration, a sunglasses line with California-based Oliver Peoples, Brunello Cucinelli stepped into the world of beauty, launching a fragrance each for women and men in March. “I think it’s not a new direction, it’s more of an evolution,” says Cucinelli. “We like the idea of giving you the look, but also to give you something for a lifestyle.”

This successful positioning of quiet luxury has been accompanied by– relatively–quiet marketing. Rather than heavily relying on celebrity endorsement for the sake of the celebrity, Brunello Cucinelli has set its sights on socially influential figures. Cucinelli started a project titled Be Your Change in 2021, inviting guests who share the brand’s values to tell their personal stories on a video and podcast series. Olympian skier Eileen Gu and Chinese fashion entrepreneur and philanthropist Wendy Yu are among “the very interesting people who are from completely different worlds that made a difference in their life”, Cucinelli says. “It’s very important to share with the new generation that not all that we see on social media is perfect. You need to work and [face] challenges.”

In case you missed it: Exclusive: How Fashion Powerhouse Wendy Yu Is Redefining ‘Made in China’

The brand also actively speaks out about sustainability. “It is a strong word that now we are starting to see [more often] ... for us, it’s a 45-year-old story,” Cucinelli says. Nature has always played an important role in the company, which is committed to taking care of the land, finding an equilibrium between animals, land and people. The company invests in renewable energy and in finding ways to reduce greenhouse gas emissions, and only uses sustainable materials, including organic cotton, cashmere and recycled fibres manufactured locally in Umbria.

The founder has also worked with King Charles III, pairing up with the then Prince of Wales in 2020 on a project run by the latter’s Sustainable Markets Initiatives (SMI) Fashion Task Force, a group dedicated to regenerative farming. The Himalayan Regenerative Fashion Living Lab project restores degraded landscapes and helps traditional handicraft and textile skills to improve local cashmere, cotton and silk economies, addressing global challenges related to climate change and biodiversity loss.

Following her father’s humanistic outlook, Cucinelli’s approach to sustainability incorporates nurturing the artisans of tomorrow. The brand funded The School of Contemporary High Craftsmanship and Arts in Solomeo in 2013, where young girls and boys learn about manufacturing and Italian crafts, receiving monthly scholarships. “It’s a school, but at the same time you receive something for living. It’s important to attract the young generation in this way,” says Cucinelli. “Now the company is full of these young people— younger artisans that make garments. This is beautiful.”

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