THE JOURNAL
You don’t have to choose between performance and design with this alpine brand .
It’s hard to overstate the success story that is Moncler. Since its acquisition in 2003 by the Italian entrepreneur Mr Remo Ruffini, this once-small mountaineering brand has blossomed into a listed company that, last year, boasted revenues of over €1bn. With its quilted down jackets now as popular with well-heeled executives as they are with celebrities – Drake famously wore a crimson Maya jacket in the video for 2015’s “Hotline Bling” – you’d be forgiven for thinking that the brand might have forgotten its roots.
Happily, that couldn’t be further from the truth. Moncler’s connection to the mountains remains as strong as ever. Earlier this year, MR PORTER decided to take the brand back to its spiritual home: the rarefied air and snow-capped peaks of the Swiss Alps. We were accompanied by Mr Jonathan Bruchez, 28, a Swiss IFMGA-certified mountain guide. Hailing from Lourtier, an Alpine village lying in the shadow of Mont Fort and Bec des Rosses, the twin peaks that provided the dramatic backdrop for this photoshoot, Mr Bruchez is as qualified a local guide as anyone could ask for – and he also doubled as a model, showing off a few pieces from Moncler’s performance skiwear line, Moncler Grenoble.
Mr Bruchez comes from a lineage of Swiss mountaineers; his father, a well-respected mountain guide, was responsible for opening a number of free-riding routes in the Verbier area. He died in 2001 after slipping into a crevasse on Petit Combin, a mountain just six kilometres south of Lourtier. Most people would be put off by such a tragedy, but for the young Mr Bruchez, who was just 12 at the time, it only strengthened his resolve to follow in his father’s footsteps. “I became even more addicted to ski, freeride and mountaineering,” he said. Less than a decade later, he was one of the youngest fully qualified mountain guides in Switzerland.
The name Moncler is an abbreviation of Monestier-de-Clermont, a small Alpine town situated 30km from Grenoble. It was here, in 1952, that the company was founded by Messrs René Ramillon and André Vincent, two young mountaineers who met in the Jeunesse et Montagne, a youth movement established during the German occupation of France during WWII. While it was initially known for making tents, sleeping bags and other mountaineering equipment, Moncler soon became synonymous with one product: the down-filled jacket.
These jackets were originally made for the factory workers, who would wear them to stay warm during winter. It wasn’t until the famous mountaineer Mr Lionel Terray, another friend from Jeunesse et Montagne, requested them for an upcoming expedition that they were even considered for production. The company’s first line of jackets, produced under the name “Moncler Pour Lionel Terray”, were subsequently worn on expeditions as far afield as the Andes and the Himalayas.
It is this spirit of far-flung adventure that defined Moncler’s early years, and that is celebrated now with Moncler Grenoble, a skiwear and après-ski diffusion line that was first introduced in 2010. The visual hallmarks of the brand are all here – the vibrant colours, lacquered finishes, and, of course, that iconic Moncler cockerel logo on the left shoulder – but there’s more to these garments than meets the eye. Practical flourishes, such as internal powder skirts, integrated Recco rescue systems and quilted linings, mean that they’re capable of standing up to the outerwear produced by far more technically minded ski brands.
Choosing skiwear is all too often a case of choosing between looks and performance. Would you rather be a wet and freezing James Bond, or a warm and dry Michelin man? Thankfully, in Moncler Grenoble, there’s a brand that allows you to have the best of both worlds.