MILAN — Loro Piana is shining a light on one of its time-honed, superior manual traditions.
During Milan Design Week, the Italian luxury house will introduce a new project dubbed “Studies,” and the Chapter I will focus on the plaid.
Plaids have a special meaning for Loro Piana since they were among the first finished products of the house, together with scarves, since the mid-1980s, and materials and weaving techniques were explored with both creative freedom and meticulous craftsmanship.
Through Studies, Loro Piana plans to approach interior design by examining a specific object, function or use, through distinct chapters.
The installation will be staged at Loro Piana’s sprawling Milan headquarters in the central Cortile della Seta, where previous interiors presentations have taken place over the past few years. Chapter I will be open to the public from Tuesday to April 26.
A Loro Piana plaid
MATTIA AQUILA
“Plaids have a deep-rooted significance in Loro Piana’s legacy since the 1980s, marking the beginning of the house’s venture into the world of finished products,” chief executive officer Frédéric Arnault told WWD exclusively. “This exhibition conceived for the 2026 Milan Design Week is a desire to explore, honor and build upon a key element that has shaped our story and commitment to excellence.
“Due to their versatility, plaids were approached like couture, highlighting our exceptional savoir-faire and enabling us to creatively experiment with raw materials, finishes, weights, embellishments and weaving techniques.”
The installation will be structured as a passage, offering visitors 24 plaids, each presented as an individual study. These unique pieces are differentiated by techniques, constructions, patterns and finishes.
A Loro Piana plaid
MATTIA AQUILA
The plaids are crafted from the brand’s finest fabrics, including vicuña, baby cashmere, cashmere, The Gift of Kings and the Loro Piana Royal Lightness, together with linen and innovative fabrics such as cashfur, Wish wool and the Pecora Nera wool.
Unveiled in February after two years of extensive research, the trademarked Loro Piana Royal Lightness yarn and fabric as a yarn is a mix of silk and merino wool, and as fabric, it’s a blend of silk and cashmere.
Developed and processed by the company’s in-house team at its facilities in Roccapietra and Quarona, Italy, Loro Piana is ranking Royal Lightness among its consolidated excellences, such as The Gift of Kings.
Through the installation, Loro Piana will also highlight the techniques and craftsmanship necessary to create the plaids.
Techniques range from embroidery, appliqué and handloom weaving to needle punching, patchwork and screen printing.
Historic symbols and graphic elements sourced from the house’s archives reappear throughout the selection, translated into contemporary compositions. Variations in color, pattern, texture and construction reveal the breadth of Loro Piana’s savoir-faire through singular forms.
Each piece is crafted exclusively upon request.
The making of a Loro Piana plaid.
EMMANUEL LAFAY
Through weaving, embroidery and textile construction, the plaids include:
- The Loro Piana Sceneries series evokes emblematic landscapes within the house’s universe, from the territory of Valsesia, the region where Loro Piana was founded in 1924, to views of snow-covered mountains.
- Codes of the house, which includes the Belt motif, initially developed as a lining for ready-to-wear garments, and the Suitcase Stripe, which originated from suitcases first commissioned by Franco Loro Piana, the grandson of founder Pietro Loro Piana, for his personal travels and was later adopted by sales representatives to carry fabric samples when visiting clients.
- Botanic Repertoire includes the thistle motif, present in the house’s coat of arms since 1951, as historically, dried thistle heads were used to finish wool and cashmere fabrics, gently raising the fibers to create a refined surface — a process that remains part of Loro Piana’s textile expertise — and the flax flower, a source of linen.
- Cardo Paisley was introduced into the house’s fabric collections in the late 1960s, and paisley has become a recurring element across shawls and plaids.
- Textured Abstractions highlight the technical experimentation of Loro Piana with more conceptual compositions, where the design emerges primarily through texture, volume and material rather than through figurative motifs.
The display is structured through a series of wooden elements developed in three distinct tones of oak, reflecting the different expressions of Loro Piana’s plaids, approached as textile compositions.
The construction emphasizes the material quality of the wood and each piece is suspended from a frame that allows close inspection of the weave, patterns and colors.
The layout unfolds as a winding path, leading from the first gallery, beginning with the Loro Piana Sceneries and concluding with the Textured Abstractions.
The exhibition also allows visitors to explore Loro Piana’s crafts and techniques developed over more than a century, from needle-punching and jacquard weaving — which integrates complex motifs directly into the structure of the textile through controlled variations of yarn color and weave density — to screen printing, when colors are applied through successive screens onto the textile surface.
