Barefoot- Luxury Reimagined

If you type ‘barefoot luxury’ into Google, you'll be overwhelmed by the number of resorts in exotic locations trying to hypnotize you while you sit at your desk in the middle of the city. Seychelles, Indonesia, Morocco, Costa Rica, Sri Lanka and amazing places that awaken our senses as we can almost feel the beach breeze caress our face. And although it's a term mostly related to travel, a website for 'the word aficionado's guide to latest words' (wordspy.com) describes Barefoot Luxury as 'comfort and elegance in a relaxed setting'. So far so good!

Time magazine described the concept as 'an upmarket restatement of the backpackers beach holiday, stressing simplicity and raw nature'. The article described a beautiful Indonesian hotel on Nikoi Island, where the beach houses are designed using natural driftwood with open and well ventilated bathrooms, a place where you can connect with nature and go back to basics. I think I've seen a number of these resorts in Costa Rica.

But, barefoot is also a state in which our feet are naked, exposed. A state in which we can relax and be ourselves, with no need to cover the long lost pedicure of the winter months. That place where superficiality disappears, because let’s be real, real is beautiful. And we find ourselves landing our ego -with our feet on the ground- hopefully both! And our head in the clouds.

The word Luxury comes from the Latin for excess. It is defined as a surplus, looked-for item that is expensive or difficult to obtain; or a state of great comfort or elegance, especially when involving great expense. But what does the future of luxury look like? Famous lamp designer David Trubridge told 1.618 Paris Sustainable Luxury Exhibition "I am going to stick my neck out and say that there should be no future for excess". And indeed I couldn't agree more with this statement, the days of conspicuous consumption à la Marie Antoinette are over.

Kevin Kelley, executive editor or wired magazine and author of the book What Technology Wants wrote: “We address the problems of tomorrow not with today’s tools but with the tools of tomorrow. This is what we call progress.”If we are to be working hard at building and designing a glorious future and luxury brands are well known for being industry leaders, this means that there is no space lagging at the forefront of sustainability and innovation. Living in the era of the dot coms, technology and innovation have an enormous effect on how we do business. The pursuit of the luxury should be to raise the bar to the uppermost standards known to man and inspire, to provide a vision to accomplish and from which to make people feel fulfilled. Luxury should remain at the upper most level of industry, showing impeccability throughout its production chains and leading the way to progress.

But traditional luxury brands still remain on the traditional end, finding it even hard to adapt within our new communication schemes. Reality is, that it's time to explore changing consumer attitudes, emerging technologies and how new product developments are reshaping the landscape, challenging brands across industries to reboot traditional values for the next generation, a generation that is said to be more environmentally aware.

There are several emerging brands that have positioned themselves within the luxury market, driven by conviction and committed creators they have placed sustainability at the core with ground breaking business models. However, the traditional luxury industry remains pretty conservative. Why not make luxury and technology a crossroad for innovation? Great advancement has been made, where we’ve found a connection between synthetic biology and textile production that could replace harmful fabric manufacturing processes. I very recently came across an article about how scientists are producing a leather-like material made out of pineapple leaves in Latin America, years after Stella McCartney, pioneer in the vegan movement has been using lab grown leather in her designs. So, how about we look for solutions in nature to go back to nature? How about we embrace technology and let it be the vehicle towards the positive advancement of society?

Piñatex®

My interest in sustainable luxury sparked because of the very unique set of strengths and opportunities that characterize luxury brands, including their undeniable desirability, allowing them an advantageous leadership locus. Business is about identifying emerging opportunities and this one is just starting to be uncovered. In this, my first joyful blog entry I make a brief introduction to my core beliefs. I hearten innovation and its potential to pursue sustainable development. I will be promoting those projects that are trying to redefine the future and those that challenge the status quo. I want to celebrate them and give them space to grow so that they can impersonate the highest rank of human accomplishment in terms of innovation, creativity and beauty, retaining the quality, craft and heritage luxury is characterized by. Because we are all in search of true meaning and as a demanding consumer, I decide to go real, transparent... I decide to go barefoot, to reimagine luxury and shape the future for good!