Luxury and know-how: a card to play for Switzerland Â?<

Swissness boosted by chocolate or Saint-Gall lace, everyone knows it. As Xavier Casile, Franco-Swiss advertising author of the book " So Sweet Zerland " which praises all these nuggets made in Switzerland, reminds us, Switzerland is a country which has " good Heidi ". But once the cliché is exhausted, what remains of Swiss know-how today and is it content to remain in its very green backyard?

The spirit of innovation found in all four corners of Switzerland is well exported, helped by the Switzerland Global Enterprise (S-GE), formerly OSEC, and relayed by the Swiss Business Hubs in abroad, who have since redoubled their efforts to sell Switzerland's assets even more intensely, despite the vote on 9 February. And it works. Big names even come on pilgrimage to Switzerland to better understand this Swiss particularity.

Mark Schumacher, head of the master's in luxury management at the HES-HEG in Geneva: "The Swiss specificity seems to me to be the ability of a brand not only to offer a product, but to succeed in going beyond it to offer an emotion, a universe. Ricola sweets are a good example. All in all, they are sweets, but the image is much richer than that, transmits values, provokes attachment, induces a quality. This is what the big brands are looking for. In this regard, I remember being called upon to advise the Samsung telephony brand some time ago. She was looking to build a universe like what Apple had managed to do and to better understand why in Switzerland we had this ability. We therefore took a tour of Switzerland of the various high-performance small and medium-sized companies in the premium and high-end environment and with a strong presence abroad. It was very instructive for them. »

Switzerland's strengths, the training, innovation and highly skilled workforce that have shaped the history of Swiss industry have always been conditioned by the country's position and geographical specificities. This applies to ribbons in the 18^th century, textiles, chemicals, pharmaceuticals, watchmaking-peasantry, then today life sciences or cleantechs. But what about the sectors of the luxury industry?

Does Switzerland have a growing role to play against its historically pioneering European neighbors? Franck Belaich, director of the master's in luxury marketing for CREA and SAWI: "What I notice today in Switzerland is that its specificity, its know-how remain very linked to a culture, not chosen, but constrained by its geography. This gives a character that could be described as rigorous, persevering, needy, assets in the world of fine watchmaking, but which become faults when one is in other sectors, such as perfumery, fashion. Swiss know-how is essentially in the extreme technical mastery and in the ethics of functionality. In my opinion, there is no highlighting of the personality. While luxury must be in the dialogue, in the roughness, the madness, or at least in the audacity. Swiss luxury could be summed up in what Americans call "spectacularly unspectacular".

But in the current luxury trend to fight against obsolescence, Swiss know-how has, in this sense, a real card to play. It is even a mark of longevity, for Nicolas Le Moigne, head of the luxury master's degree at ECAL. “Thinking about luxury in Switzerland means thinking for me about brands like Vitra and USM, for example. Both of which are brands that have been around for a long time and whose design has remained unchanged. These are iconic objects that last over time, for me the first value of luxury. Citing a brand like USM in the world of luxury may seem contradictory a priori. It is not the material that makes the luxury, but how the craftsman works it. The degree of finish, the attention to detail are components of luxury. Swiss know-how, Swiss design are characterized by ultra-functionality. A design that does not let go, like the Swiss army knife. The quality of execution, the degree of requirement and perfection are the fundamental values ​​that value Swiss know-how. And a fortiori in luxury. What we try to share with ECAL students is this idea of ​​design that lasts over time, minimalist and very precise. These specificities, very Swiss, are a playing card for the country within the world of global luxury. Which I would complement with its very strong ability to innovate and use the most advanced technologies, thanks to EPFL among others. ECAL has been working for a long time to build this bridge between technology and application through the ECAL LAB. »

Knowing how to combine innovative technologies and traditional artisanal or industrial processes is certainly one of the keys to the Swiss exception. Swiss know-how is born where you least expect it. And even manage to supplant or advise glorious historical houses abroad. Three examples of luxury craftsmanship that are neither watches nor chocolate.

Matteo Gonet

Glassworksthe king of light - -

Artist and master glassmaker, Matteo Gonet and the 14 craftsmen who today make up his workshop from Münchenstein to Basel have been working tirelessly for several months in the greatest effervescence. They have succeeded in the somewhat crazy bet of blowing under the beards of the Venetian artists of Murano one of the most prestigious European achievements in art glassware of recent decades.

The young glassblower, originally from Ticino, has just won one of the biggest contracts in his history: the creation of a series of glass fountains for the Water Theater grove in Versailles. Destroyed after the passage of the Lothar storm, the renovated site is intended as a contemporary tribute to Le Nôtre.

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The project, led by the famous sculptor Jean-Michel Othoniel and the landscape architect Louis Benech, proposes as a high point the realization of sculpture-fountains, sorts of inverted interlacing of mirror balls gilded with gold leaf. gold placed at water level along a basin of more than 100 meters. The project will be presented for the first time to the press in the fall, then officially inaugurated in the spring of 2015.

Prestigious recognition of its know-how, but also of its logistical capacity to produce in an organized and perfectly controlled manner, it proves that talent and prestige alone are not enough. The ability to innovate, anticipate and orchestrate an artistic production are all decisive arguments that decided Jean-Michel Othoniel to choose Swiss know-how over the famous Murano craftsmen.

Bringing his art well beyond Swiss borders, Matteo Gonet has been working there for almost twenty years. Very few end customers form its audience. It is with designers, architects and artists that its notoriety is essential. Many admire his ability to transcend the commissioned work to restore a sensitive and intelligent understanding of it. A collaboration more than an execution. His constant search, from the start, for new ways of approaching the glassmaking profession opens doors for him that others do not push. Orders are raining down.

Its turnover doubles every year. Brands as prestigious as Nestlé, Swatch, Credit Suisse, Chanel trust him. But Matteo Gonet does not make any business plan. For him, "these are happy combinations of circumstances". His ambition? "Producing 100% Swiss, because that's a real argument, but also creating an in-house label, even if time is short. »

JMC Lutherie

The sound of life -

Better than the Italian luthiers in Cremona or Mirecourt in France? A fuller sound than Japanese or French high-tech audio? Le Brassus and its Risoux forest have been home to master luthier-guitarier Jeanmichel Capt for thirty years, whom many consider to be one of the world's leading experts in the field. For thirty years, this sound virtuoso has succeeded in making a name for himself in the land of watches. Thanks to his guitars (nearly 200 instruments), then by the realization of resonance supports for chiming timepieces.

Céline Renaud, director and co-founder of the JMC Lutherie company created in 2005, was able to recognize and amplify her talent beyond the mountains, she who has long sharpened her eye as an expert in watch marketing. But how does a luthier-guitarist become the undisputed sound expert? And why Le Brassus? It is Jeanmichel Capt's talent and stroke of genius to have brought together two techniques that are a priori not very compatible: the vibration of the wood of harmony coupled with the audio technology of the XXI^th century.

It was the invention of his " sound sculpture ", the Soundboard, which would best embody this revolutionary concept and give it the necessary echo at the heart of a universe that is not very permeable, that of luxury. This square and slightly curved membrane in resonance spruce equipped with amplifiers at the back surprises with its sobriety. Here, the couple of traditional loudspeakers, very rarely aesthetic, is replaced by a very simple panel of rare wood that hangs on the wall, like a piece of art. Jeanmichel Capt's idea: to replace the traditional membrane of an audio device with resonance spruce, which has always made the sound of Stradivarius vibrate.

Furthermore, according to reports from several acoustic laboratories, including EPFL and HEIG-VD among others, the Soundboard offers a very low harmonic distortion rate, at values ​​5 to 10 times higher weaker than a good quality loudspeaker, and a very natural stereo rendering. The secret: resonance spruce from Le Brassus. Because it is on the Swiss side of the Risoux forest, in the Joux valley, that the most beautiful specimens in the world are hidden, apart from those of the forests of the Val di Fiemme in the Dolomites, where the stradivarius came from .

This singularity led Jeanmichel Capt to value its treasures. But among these jewels, only one resonance spruce in 10,000 has all the criteria. To recognize it, tree "pickers", trained to detect its qualities: a spruce at least 300 years old, whose straightness and bark must be perfect, without knots or resin pockets. All picked in the fall, with the waning moon. But it is listening that the awakening of the senses caused by the Soundboard is activated.

Sound fills the room completely. Instruments and voices seem to be embodied, as in the middle of a concert. A patent filed in 2007 protects its secrets. The greatest electronics specialists have already signed partnerships with JMC Lutherie and around thirty countries already distribute the Soundboard. The development is just beginning. The taste for innovation is there. Moreover, other techniques and materials, including composites, are of interest to Jeanmichel Capt and Céline Renaud. " We are a bit like the Bertrand Cardis of violin making! “, will conclude the co-founder.

Mover

A fiber story

Entrepreneurial, artistic or purely attached to textile innovation, the fiber that drives Nicolas Rochat to invest time and resources in his Mover brand seems unbreakable. The brand, initially Swedish, had enjoyed considerable success in Europe in the sharp middle of technical sports clothing before losing its identity in the trap of diversification at all costs and the loss of control of the supply in an Asian outsourcing.

Bought by Nicolas Rochat in 2005, Mover is now entirely Swiss, its production repatriated to Europe and the company's headquarters moved from Stockholm to Lausanne. In his studio-loft in the west of Lausanne, Nicolas Rochat has just received the first samples of the winter 2015 "dress to ski" collections and for the first time his new outdoor collection "dress to move". The cuts are classic, the colors more sober than the "color blocks" of previous years.

But the added value of Mover ultraluxe technical clothing is still in the material used, 100% Swiss wool coupled with Gore-Tex. This idea was born from a simple observation by Nicolas Rochat, a high mountain enthusiast: since the beginnings of mountaineering, no material other than wool has allowed athletes to climb the peaks in dry and warm conditions. Nylon and other polyester not reaching the ankle of the sweaty athlete. Nicolas Rochat: "I had wanted to imagine a high-performance garment for breathability for years. Gore-Tex offers breathable membranes, but the garments available on the market couple it with polyester insulation, which does not allow air and moisture to pass through. In my opinion, the only material that can counter this problem is wool, because it has the three ideal qualities for technical clothing: breathability, thermoregulation and lightness (14 microns). »

From then on, all Mover clothing is based on the same principle: 100% Swiss wool close to the body for the underwear or integrated into insulating padding instead of synthetic for the pants and jackets. Nicolas Rochat has also pushed the quality to its limit by choosing to source alpaca wool from the Swiss mountains. An ultra-sharp luxury that only the Mover brand has access to.

Mover's research then focused on how to fix the wool fiber without weaving it to let as much air as possible get between the fibers. A breakthrough that, among other things, led Mover to receive the ISPO Award 2014, which recognizes the best ski jacket of the year, for its innovation, design and functionality. This first-rate expertise has since reverberated far beyond the Swiss peaks.

As proof, the prestigious Italian brand Z Zegna, recognized worldwide for its textile know-how, is now calling on Mover for its unique mastery of combining wool and technical clothing.

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