10 minutes with… The great-great-great-grandson of Louis Vuitton
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10 minutes with… The great-neat-great-grandson of Louis Vuitton
What'south it like being the 6th generation scion of the Vuitton empire? What does a typical calendar week wait like? Who would play Louis Vuitton in a picture show? All your questions (and more) answered in CNA Luxury's chat with Benoit-Louis Vuitton.
Benoit-Louis Vuitton, 44, is Louis Vuitton's corporate managing director of Art, Culture and Patrimony. (Photo: Louis Vuitton)
27 Oct 2022 06:31AM (Updated: 27 October 2022 06:47AM)
Tall, handsome, charming, stylish, and the sixth-generation descendant of Louis Vuitton, in that location could be no better frontman for the French luxury house than 44-year-erstwhile Benoit-Louis Vuitton.
As its corporate director of Fine art, Culture and Patrimony, he represents and embodies the heritage and values of the company, handles customer relations for loftier-end customers, and manages the Asnieres Family House (which he lived in till he was vii), too as the company's gallery and exhibition contents.
To mark 200 years later the birth of his not bad-great-swell-gramps, Benoit-Louis recently hosted an intimate virtual bout of the Asnieres house and atelier that Louis Vuitton congenital near Paris, France.
CNA Luxury: Thanks for having us! Tell us about the Asnieres business firm and how important it is to the family.
Benoit-Louis Vuitton: The original family firm was built a little after the Asnieres atelier, which was built four or five years later Louis Vuitton founded the maison in Paris in 1854, equally he needed a bigger space to create his traditional trunks.
The dining room is decorated very simply. There'southward a small display of wedding trunks that Gaston, grandson of Louis Vuitton, collected. Eastern and Heart Eastern in origin, they're decorated with motifs such as lovebirds, which stand for love and the richness of family life.
Gaston was a crazy collector of everything and anything. Thanks to him, we are starting to gather archives, with more than than 100,000 documents, and twenty,000 objects, not just from Louis Vuitton.
The living room dates back to 1900 and is an extension created past George, son of Louis Vuitton. It's Fine art Nouveau in style and richer in terms of ornament, with ceiling mouldings, paintings, stained glass windows, a green ceramic fireplace with floral motifs, a statuary bosom of Louis Vuitton, and one of Louis Vuitton's earlier trunks in striped canvas, equally a coffee tabular array.
The rich environs was created to welcome suppliers and showcase how artistic and successful the business was. At present this room has an old, vintage experience to it, but it was very modern and innovative for its time.
What memories do you have growing upwardly in this firm?
It was dainty growing upwardly in a identify similar that. Non only in the family house, but running effectually the workshop. The environment influenced my values and way of life –manufacturing, craftsmanship, innovation, how things expect.
My brother and I also spent a lot of time playing in the garden. We found it funny to throw things around and suspension the fiddling drinking glass panels of the living room's stained glass windows. We also had yearly BBQs in summer and Christmas parties with all the employees.
And where practice you live now?
In an apartment in Paris, which is modern, but filled with vintage pieces from my [belatedly] father (Patrick-Louis Vuitton). I spend weekends in my begetter's country house, which I'g getting renovated at the moment. I'yard keeping the old wooden frame just incorporating a contemporary glass house, and ownership pieces of modern art for information technology.
I am a mix of history and tradition, innovation and modernity, and then I like to mix things up. It goes with my Dna, and with the curiosity we have at Louis Vuitton to remain innovative.
What has your career path been like?
I did Direction and Marketing studies in a Franco-American business concern school in Paris, then internships in Paris, London and Japan for Louis Vuitton and Chaumet. I was watch and jewellery manager at a store in New York from 2003 to 2005.
From 2005 to 2015, I was caput of product for Watches, then head of commercial evolution of Loftier Watchmaking; I was as well involved in the commercial development of High Jewellery.
From 2022 to 2019, I was manager of the Canadian Toronto Maison, then from 2022 to 2020, I was manager of Client Experiences for Louis Vuitton Atelier. This year, I became corporate director, Art, Culture and Patrimony.
You're a picket buff?
Yes, merely I don't count the number of watches I own.
Even as boys, my brother and I liked watches and jewellery. We used to fight a bit, so my father told u.s., "if you behave, you volition each get a x-franc coin at dark. Nosotros made 270 french francs each afterward a month – not the full 310, because there were days we did fight. We used the money to buy Swatches as nosotros were collecting them then.
When my blood brother turned eighteen, he requested a sentry as a gift. I did the same. For men, it's the only precious stone y'all can habiliment. There's always a story behind watches. That's why when y'all start collecting them, y'all never stop.
Before I started working with the family concern, my begetter [Patrick-Louis] had jokingly said every generation has to bring something new to the concern.
I said I would innovate watches and jewellery to Louis Vuitton. What nosotros did in the concluding 15 to twenty years – business has been growing, and I am proud to be part of that. I had the luck to work with our master watchmakers Michel Navas and Enrico Barbasini, who still work in Geneva (at La Fabrique du Temps Louis Vuitton).
What's a typical week like for you?
Crazy, because nosotros merely finished the [way] shows. What I similar most nigh the shows is the mean solar day after, where we see and touch the products – the quality, creativity, attention to particular and adroitness – with our clients.
There's no typical week, more than like there'southward a typical 60 minutes. I'grand ever jumping from one topic to another, going from one coming together to another, crossing betwixt buildings as our offices are located in two different buildings. It's crazy but interesting. In that location'due south then much free energy, seeing different people, as I work with all the departments – communications, client relations, and then on.
On weekends, I visit the country house to rest mentally, merely I have many activities going on there! When yous are working for LV and with the family, you are always on the go. We are all basics. It's not a question of age, but of mentality. As long equally yous're curious about life, nearly everything, that's what makes things interesting.
Yesterday we launched to press a new (fictionalised) novel almost Louis Vuitton. Nosotros likewise talked about if we were to exercise a film about the life of Louis Vuitton, who would exist the actors? We had in mind a French-American actor as a young Louis Vuitton, maybe Anthony Hopkins every bit an older Louis Vuitton. As for Louis around xl… mayhap it would be Virgil [Abloh]… it matches our spirit of disruption.
What are your favourite Louis Vuitton items for everyday employ?
The blackness-and-white varsity jacket from the SS2021 menswear collection, with alphabet patches and mitt-knitted crochet flowers on information technology.
My Keepall Bandouliere 50 in Damier Distorted Sail from a SS2021 popup, with black-and-white Damier checks. I like that information technology's a traditional purse shape created many years ago, but with a modern interpretation.
My Monogram wallet, with a colourful interior.
The Louis Vuitton Escale Spin Time Meteorite watch, with a titanium case, rose gold bezel, a overnice machinery, and a face made out of real meteorite. Y'all're wearing billions of years on your wrist!
In terms of shoes: Sneakers fabricated out of python, and leather boots with a beautiful patina – black with a tint of green.
What are your hobbies and interests outside of work?
I'thou an outdoorsy person. I similar to go to the gym, ride horses, ride bikes, run, be exterior, and exist in nature with animals.
What are yous upwards to next?
A trip to South Africa. I similar the idea of being surrounded past big lions and other animals, not being connected to media, being told not to exit the bedchamber at nighttime to go to the outdoors bathroom just x metres away, because there are wildlife effectually.
I'chiliad going to encounter gorillas too. I like the idea that I am one little human in front of a big family of gorillas who can suspension y'all into 2 with their bare hands. In a family like mine, we live with a lot of privilege, merely it's prissy to feel you are just a little something in a big globe.
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Source: https://cnalifestyle.channelnewsasia.com/people/benoit-louis-vuitton-interview-286147
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