The name Loro Piana stands for soft – soft cashmere sweaters, soft suede shoes, soft leather bags. But not just any kind of sweet – the the sweetest sweet. So soft, it can be hard to describe in words the feel of its fabrics.

This week I sat on a plush white Palm Duet lounge chair covered in Loro Piana Cashfur – yes, cashfur, an epicurean fabric they developed using cashmere and silk – in the brand’s new “Home for the Holidays” pop-up store in Aspen. The experience was similar to what I imagine a polar bear hug would feel, or sink into a dollop of whipped cream in a mug of hot chocolate. It was just… really sweet.

The chair was made in collaboration with French designer Raphael Navot, who fell in love with Loro Piana’s cashfur fabric after using it for his own interior projects. The brand also uses a patented gel in its furniture cushions, so that when you sit down it takes the shape of your body, and when you stand up it bounces back to its original position.

“It’s something desirable because it really hugs your body, like the palm of a hand,” said Francesco Pergamo, who has worked for the company for almost 20 years and has been appointed director of Loro. Piana Interiors in 2019. He was talking about the chair’s inviting texture, but also its organic curved shape, which allows two people to snuggle up close – hence the name.

Of course, it makes sense that a brand (and this chair) known for their comfy textiles would find a home in Aspen, “the Paris of Colorado” as a friend described it, where a number of other brands, from Gabriela Hearst in Kith, have also set up shop for the winter. The first Loro Piana Aspen store opened in 1999, but the special “Home for the Holidays” pop-up, which is just a few blocks away, is open until December 21.

Loro Piana’s Home for the Holidays pop-up in Aspen, in front of the Jerome Hotel.
Photo: Courtesy of Loro Piana

In addition to the thick and warm scarves, gloves and ski balaclavas, customers can also purchase the Loro Piana Interiors collection in the pop-up, which includes furniture like the Palm Duet chair, as well as lamps, pillows, blankets, candles and more to make your home as lavish as possible. This is the first time that these interior items have been available for purchase by the general public. (Well, anyone looking to spend a lot of money on furniture. Like most luxury things, the Palm Duet chair, for example, is “price on request”.)

Previously, Loro Piana’s interior business was reserved for private commissions, with interior designers, architects and decorators requesting the brand’s textiles for their clients’ homes, but also their cars, boats and private jets – so it tells you more about the caliber of clients they tend to attract.

“They started to create fabrics that were completely unexpected for use in the interior design world,” Pergamo said. A cashmere sofa? On a boat? Of course, Loro Piana can make that happen for you.

Furniture from the Loro Piana Ginza collection at the Aspen pop-up.
Photo: Courtesy of Loro Piana

One of the first items Loro Piana ever produced was actually a cover. (The brand, founded in Italy in 1924, is almost 100 years old.) “It all starts with the fabric and the textile tradition, and we have tried to identify projects in which this textile can be magnified and pushed to the maximum,”, Pergamon explained.

True to Loro Piana fashion, it is the details that make his interior collection very special. “The fabric is tailored to each piece of furniture as if it were a bespoke suit,” Pergamo explained, running his hands along the minimal seams of a chair. After a long day of traveling, my buttocks were very impressed.