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DISCOVER SEA ISLAND COTTON
There’s exclusive, and then there’s LMH exclusive.
We’ve created a t-shirt so limited, so luxurious, that even if we purchased the world’s entire supply of this rare cotton for a whole year, only one person in every 100,000 on this planet could own it along with the matching white shirt.
How is this true? Let’s do the math and see why Sea Island equals the world’s most exclusive wardrobe staple.
Approximately 120 million bales of cotton are produced each year. Of these, only a mere 150 (yep, 150) bales are sea island cotton. That means these fantastically rare and sensuously fine fibres represent only 0.000125% of the world’s entire cotton production.
One bale of cotton can produce 765 fitted shirts or 1,217 t-shirts. So, even if LMH purchased the entire global supply of Sea Island cotton and cornered the market for two years, we could only ever produce 114,750 fitted shirts and 182,550 t-shirts.
Given that planet earth has a population of 7,674 billion people, that means that only one person out of every 66,875 could ever own a Sea Island cotton shirt, and only one person out of every 42,037 could own a Sea Island cotton t-shirt. For each extremely fortunate customer who managed to own one fitted shirt and one t-shirt, they would be is less than one in 100,000 people. Just 0.001% of the population!
No wonder that sea island cotton has been the discerning choice of such celebrated figures throughout the years as Queen Victoria of England, Ian Fleming’s world-famous spy James Bond and, more recently, Gwyneth Paltrow and Madonna.
It is quite simply one of the most exclusive fabrics on earth, which is why it is so favoured by the elite. Of course, its rarity is only part of the story.
So, besides being fantastically rare, what makes Sea Island cotton so special and different from other kind of cotton?
It’s all in the length of its fibre. The longer the fibres, the finer the yarn – and the smoother and stronger the fabric.
Most of commercial cotton (90%) is made of short-staple varieties compared with 10% of els (extra long staple) cotton. Of the els cotton variety, supima is the most common. The length of Sea Island cotton fibre? 150% that of supima.
Besides its length, the fibre of Sea Island cotton is exceptionally fine, and produces a significant brightness with an extremely low number of imperfections. This translates into a sensuously silky lustre, a unique softness and a wonderfully durable high tensile strength – in short, unrivaled beauty and comfort.
While the technical qualities of Sea Island cotton can be measured in the laboratory, also added are its intangible qualities: its ability to look reborn after every wash, as if the fibres possess a life of their own which continues to renew over time, restoring form to each fabric design that is created.
But if this cotton is so special, why is it produced in such a limited quantity?
Sea Island cotton – or Gossypium Barbadense- isn’t easy to grow. It needs a very specific environment in which to thrive successfully and the cultivation of sea island follows a particular process that makes it far more expensive than all other varieties of cotton.
The seeds are carefully selected by hand to ensure the very highest quality and then sown in a meticulously regular way. Irrigation takes place mainly naturally, through heavy rainfall. Harvesting, by hand, is carried out with the utmost attention to nurture and protect that which nature has created.
Once the cotton has been collected, it is passed on for ginning (where the seeds are separated from the fibre) working at a reduced speed to limit mistakes and preserve all its special characteristics. The packaging of the cotton bales then takes place at a lower atmospheric pressure than with the other cottons, for better aeration and more preservation of the product. Each precious bale is fully traceable down to the level of knowing from which specific field it originated in order to identify with utmost precision its precise characteristics.
Sea island cotton from Barbados is directly spun in Italy with the most avant-garde equipment. Finally, the WISICA (West Indian Sea Island Cotton Association) inspects every kilo of cotton produced locally and issues the certificate of authenticity for yarns marked sea island.
Still wondering why sea island cotton is truly like no other?
Feeling is believing. Be one of the very few people in the world to wear this fabulous fabric and believe us, you will never look back.
