Displaying items by tag: luxury goods

Géza von Habsburg, an art historian in suburban New York, would have inherited part of an Austrian empire if only his ancestors had not made some terrible life choices. He did inherit the title of archduke and an interest in the history of luxury goods — the kind his family commissioned for centuries. Recently, he watched as about 100 of his family’s former heirlooms were installed at the Minneapolis Institute of Arts here for a new exhibition, “The Habsburgs: Rarely Seen Masterpieces from Europe’s Greatest Dynasty,” that runs through May.

It is the most comprehensive display yet staged for the collections from these Holy Roman Emperors, who owned palaces from Ukraine to Mexico. Gowns, rifles, suits of armor, sorbet cups, gilded knickknacks and artworks by luminaries like Rubens, Titian, Velazquez, Tintoretto and Holbein have come from the Kunsthistorisches Museum in Vienna.

The French multinational luxury goods conglomerate, LVMH Group, announced that the long-awaited Fondation Louis Vuitton Pour la Création (or the Louis Vuitton Foundation for Creation) will open on October 27 in Paris. The Foundation will be housed in a building commissioned by LVMH’s chairman and Chief Executive Officer, Bernard Arnault, and designed by the Canadian-American architect, Frank Gehry. The €100 million building, which resembles a cloud of glass, is located in Paris’ Bois de Boulogne district.

The 126,000-square-foot structure features 11 exhibition galleries that will house the modern and contemporary art collection of the LVMH Group, which includes works by Jean-Michel Basquiat, Takashi Murakami, and Jeff Koons, as well as masterpieces from Arnault’s personal holdings. The Foundation, which promotes contemporary artistic creation both in France and internationally, will also host temporary exhibitions, artist commissions, multi-disciplinary performances, and events.

Piers Wedgwood, who devoted his working life to the ceramic and decorative arts of the Wedgwood Brand as its international ambassador and keeper of the legacy of his fifth great-grandfather, Josiah Wedgwood, died yesterday of cardiac failure at the Hospital of the University of Pennsylvania. He was 59 and a long time resident of the Chestnut Hill section of Philadelphia, PA.

In a career spanning four decades, Lord Wedgwood helped navigate the fortunes of a 255 year old luxury goods company in its struggles to remain viable amidst the changing life styles of the late 20th and early 21st centuries. A veteran of two major reorganizations of the firm, Lord Wedgwood remained positive and excited as it grew in the modern age, with Wedgwood now opening major new markets in India, China and Russia as well as new product lines such as Wedgwood Tea.

Piers Anthony Weymouth Wedgwood, Fourth Baron Wedgwood was born September 20, 1954 in Nakuru, Kenya outside Nairobi on his family’s farm. He assumed the Wedgwood peerage at age 16 upon the death of his father in 1970. Educated in England at Marlborough and the Royal Military Academy Sandhurst, Lord Wedgwood was commissioned in the Royal Scots Regiment in 1973 seeing action in Cypress and retiring as a captain in 1980.

Lord Wedgwood did not view his peerage as an honorific, instead acting as a working member of the House of Lords with more than 25 years service on the Defense and Heritage Parliamentary Groups.

An active sportsman, Lord Wedgwood was a member of the Royal Automobile Club of England, the London Racquet Club and the Philadelphia Club.

Above all however, the Wedgwood Brand was Lord Wedgwood’s passion, beginning in the business in his teens cleaning the pottery kilns and learning production methods. It was soon clear, however, that his charm, speaking ability and uncanny resemblance to his ancestor Josiah made him the ideal and nearly irreplaceable spokesman for Wedgwood. For many years, Lord Wedgwood was closely identified with Wedgwood museums in England and Birmingham, Alabama, which includes the Buten Collection, formerly of Philadelphia.

In a reprise of another Philadelphia fairy tale, Lord Wedgwood met his wife, the former Mary Regina Quinn of the Fairmount section of Philadelphia, when he was presenting Wedgwood at the Marshall Field Company in Chicago where she ran the store’s public relations. The ‘old English lord’ she expected turned out to be both a dashing 26 year old and the start of a 34 year love affair. Lady Wedgwood, and a daughter, The Hon. Alexandra Mary Kavanaugh Wedgwood and two sisters survive.

Funeral arrangements are incomplete.