Alpaca Brochure

The alpaca. A synonym for exclusivity and elegance, the hair of this extraordinary South American camelid has been raw material for the manufacture of garments that have stood for thousands of years.

There are aproximately 4 million alpacas in South America and 95% live in the South of Peru. It competes in the international market with so many exquisite fibers such as the Indian cashmere and mohair, fabric made with hair from Angora goats. Each of its breeds has a particular beauty: the Suri alpaca has a coat that falls with remarkable density, luster and softness; while Huacaya is characterized by its crimped, fluffy, somewhat shorter fiber. In both cases, their outstanding quality is distinguished by their versatility, offering natural tones ranging from white to black, or from gray to brown and beige. There is also a tradition of natural dyes that has now gained value in the world again.

Mixed with silk, alpaca gets a better drape; while a blend with wool or acrylic produces a cheaper material, affordable for mass consumption.

The production chain begins with the raising and breeding of the animal. After shearing, the fiber is collected and sold for handicraft or industrial purposes. The alpaca industry, since the mid-twentieth century, produces coveted tops, yarn or fabrics, traded to the local garment industry and also exported to the most demanding European and U.S. markets. Based on technical quality criteria, the fibers are classified as baby alpaca, fleece, medium fleece, huarizo, thick and short.

Currently, programs for livestock producers, focused on optimizing and improving animal breeding genetics, have been developed. This is expected to improve the production process, which should then increase the income of a sector of the population whose economy depends on this livelihood. “The production chain begins with the raising and breeding of the animal. After shearing, the fiber is collected and sold for handicraft or industrial purposes .�

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ALPACA: DIAMOND OF THE ANDES

Alpacas are indigenous to the Peruvian highlands, where they have been domesticated since the time of Pre-lncan cultures.

There is an estimated 3.5 to 4 million Alpacas in South America; 95% of these are found mainly in the southern regions of Peru.

There are two varieties of alpaca: Huacayo and Suri.

The fibers are classified manually according to their fineness in qualities such as Royal Alpaca (less than 19 microns), Baby Alpaca (22.5 microns), Super Fine Alpaca (25.5 microns), Huarizo (29 microns), Thick (32 microns) and Mixed Pieces (short fibers usually over 32 microns).

Each quality is used to create different products such as fabrics, shawls, sweaters, blankets, carpets, etc. also mixing with other natural fibers like bambu or silk.

The Suri alpaca has a silky fiber, silky, long and exceptional brightness.

Main Qualities

The Huacayo has a short, curly, dense and fluffy fiber that covers almost all of its body leaving only its face and legs covered with short hair.

BL-SUPER

SuperBaby Alpaca

BL

Baby Alpaca

FS

FS Alpaca

SU-BL

BabySuri Alpaca

SU AG

Suri Alpaca Coarse Alpaca

19-20 mic 21.5-22.5 mic 25.5-26.5 mic 22.5 mic 27.5 mic +30 mic

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This fiber is unusually strong and resistant, and this remains the finer it is, making it ideal for industrial processes. In addition, it is easy to dye any color and always maintains its natural luster.

On the other hand the Alpaca can be worked in the combing and carding systems, being able to obtain fabrics between thick tweeds and thin gabardine. Alpaca fiber does not break, fray, stain or create static, it is easy to wash.

The alpaca has a high degree of cleanliness in the fiber after it has been processed (between 87% and 95% versus 43% to 76% of the sheep’s wool), besides that its process is easier and cheaper due to the lack of fat or lanolin in its fiber, since it is not owed (de-haired) as cashmere.

Alpaca is a silky, soft, durable fibre that has unique thermal properties due to the microscopic air pockets found within it. These pockets allow the user to breathe through the fibres on warm days, and likewise trap body heat in cold weather. It is also elastic and non-flammable.

Alpaca hair occurs in over 24 natural shades, which makes it an attractive alternative for top designers world-wide. The versatility of the Alpaca fibre allows it to be transformed into knitted and woven garments, accessories and crafts.

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THE ALPACA TRADEMARK As in the case of the Wool Company, the Association of the Cashmere and Mohair Association that have brands that guarantee products made with wool, cahsmere, and mohair respectively, the International Alpaca Association, has the Alpaca Brand, Brand which has international recognition which has established itself as the only brand that guarantees the quality of products made with alpaca fiber.

As an example, one can cite the case of Japan whose clients of our partner companies, require that products bearing the mark acquired Alpaca. The use of the mark is subject to the use regulations developed according to the demands of the global market and international quality standards.

The Alpaca brand is owned by the AIA, and consists of the following designs: Brand Collective ALPACA ORIGIN MARK SINCE 1984 It consists of the stylized figure of alpaca formed by black lines. The fiber content is 100% Alpaca in any of its qualities. They leave open the option to include licensed gold background for the quality of 100% Baby Alpaca.

Brand Collective ALPACA BLEND MARK SINCE 1984 It consists in the stylized figure of alpaca thick black lines composed. The fiber content is at least 30% Alpaca fiber in any of its qualities. The AIA gives license its brand to all those companies and breeders who meet standards of quality standards established by the institution.

The use of the quality mark “Alpaca� is governed by specific regulations to that effect adopted the Association and reflects the consensus of the assemblers, primary processors, industrialists and businessmen linked to the alpaca over 08 countries. The Alpaca quality mark is already registered in the European Community countries: Spain, France, Italy, UK, and Benelux (Belgium, Netherlands and Luxembourg), Germany, Austria, Denmark, Sweden, Finland, Ireland, Portugal and Greece, Estonia, Lithuania, Cyprus, Hungary, Malta, Slovakia, Czech Republic, Latvia, Poland and Slovenia. Also in the U.S., Canada, Japan, China (pending), Argentina, Bolivia, Chile and Peru.

By the middle of the XIX Century, British investors began looking atexporting alpaca fiber from Peru to England, looking to compete with India’s cashmere. However, its use in the Victorian era was devoted mainly to blankets, rough underwear and coats’ inner linings. This fiber was not considered as a fabric to wear, but only to keep warm.

Many decades later, a more refined alpaca fleece entered the European market in multiple applications. Frank Michell, from England, who in 1931 founded the Peruvian company Michell & Co., currently the largest producer and exporter in the world of alpaca tops and yarns, came to Peru a decade earlier. After a brilliant career as a pilot incommand in the Royal Air Force, at the end of World War I, Michell knew that his fate was not in the air. His ambition was to travel to South America and find chinchilla fur in the Andean highlands of Peru.

At the time, it was not an eccentric project: from Puno, chinchilla furs were especially coveted by the upper-class British women who paid high prices for proudly showing them off on their shoulders. The sea journey took him to the port of Bueno s Aires, then Valparaiso and finally he landed in Mollendo, Peru. He then arrived on the shore of the lake Titicaca by the Peruvian Corporation trains willing to get the coveted fur of those rodents. However, he never saw the money of that first hunt. Another pilot, a war companion, not only stole his cargo of chinchilla, but most of his belongings. “My father lost everything.He was stranded in Juliaca,” recalls Michael W. Michell, his son and current chairman of the company.

The young entrepreneur pawned a gold cigarette case, a gift from his mother, and invested this money ina new business: alpaca fiber in the town

of Santa Rosa de Juli. “The local people trusted him. He bought the fiber and shipped it to Puno by boat, then by rail to Arequipa. His buyer in this White City was his countryman Regis Stadford, who, years later, would become his fatherin-law”, he says. Indeed, from the alpaca business, both men developed closer links.

“They walked with my mom in the baby carriage, she was 9 months. When dad turned 44 and mother 20, they got married,” says the most important alpaca businessman in the country.

The business then was based on classifying and exporting greasy Alpaca fiber as raw material.

From Huancavelica and Puno, the fiber reached Arequipa where washers selected qualities to produce even quality bales, which were then exported to the port of Liverpool by steamboat. At that time, the alpaca was unknown.

The main buyer was the industrial, politician and philanthropist British Sir Titus Salt, well-known at auction houses in Bradford, where fiber was sent on consignment. Then the alpaca ‘sat’ there until it was bought. The spinners used it to mix in various applications, perhaps best known was traditional tweed, casual clothing made of soft and flexible

“Frank Michell, from England, who in 1931 founded the Peruvian company Michell & Co., is currently the largest producer and exporter in the world of alpaca tops and yarns .”

VICUNA: GOLD OF THE ANDES

Chaccu, is the Vivunas ancestral consevation ritual to obtain its fibre and protect its life, because it was considered by the Incas as a precious gift of teh gods, possessor of the golden shine of the Sun god. click:

The vicuĂąa. With its graceful elegance, the vicuĂąa is a wild species living in the Andes of Peru, Bolivia, Argentina and Chile. Peru has 70 percent of its population. The hair of this delicate and small camelid offers the finest, unique, natural, soft fiber in the world, surpassing cashmere and angora by far. Its fleece is light, bright and warm, unique properties valued from Pre-Hispanic times. In the Inca Empre, they were used only by the nobility of the Empire, and the only people authorized to weave it were the so-called virgins of the Sun. Protected by our laws, Andean communities in charge of its care maintain the ancient tradition called chaccu for shearing the animals safely and kindly. Extremely restricted for the local market due to its high price, its production, about four tons per year, is exported to very exclusive circles, for the composition of shawls, coats and scarves.

Considered Gods by the ancient inhabitants of tha Andes, the Peruvian Vicuna is part of an ancestral tradition that remains alive.

The vicuna lives in the Peruvian Andes and its fibre is 100% sustaintable and friendly to the enviroment. Each hair of a vicuna has a diameter between 10 and 12 microns.

Why is the size of the fibers so important?

By having such extremely fine hair, the fibers of the vicuna provide, when combined, an exceptional heat capacity, but also with an essential additional advantage: their weight is minimal.

The tailor Steven Hitchcock began to patronize a coat built in Vicuna for Charles of England in 2000. He handed it over a year later, and since then he has accompanied the Prince on several occasions.

The Vicuna, elegance and beauty of the Andes. It gives us the most exclusive and luxurious fibre in the world.

The vicuna fibre allow us to create unique garments and accessories of exquisite quality.

Currently, only native people have access to the care and production of vicuĂąa fiber, which has allowed in recent years to lift the economy of the most depressed rural areas of Peru.

Bibliographic Source: Michell&cia. and Incalpaca PerúModa Book- Promperú The International Alpaca Association (AIA in spanish)

Leslie Palacios lesliealejandra.pm@gmail.com