Envoy Mansion introduces Thomas Mason brand

Sara Pathirana

Dante Cortinovis, Head of Sales of the Albini Group and Marco Facchetti, Designer for ‘Thomas Mason’ were in Sri Lanka last week to launch The Best Shirt in Town, with the introduction of the Thomas Mason brand to Sri Lanka.

“We’re happy to bring this brand to Sri Lanka and thereby join hands with Envoy Mansion, Colombo’s ultimate men’s lifestyle store. The Sri Lankan clientele is one that is constantly exposed to world sartorial trends. It is very discerning and knows exactly what it wants,” Cortinovis said.

Nearly 20 years ago, the Albini family of Italy acquired Thomas Mason. This being the fifth generation of the Albini Group, it acquires seven capital intensive finishing plants with state-of-the-art machinery around Europe and has invested 20 Million Euros in Egypt, where the cotton is produced.

Five years ago, the company decided to invest in Egypt for the cotton cultivation. Egypt is the only producer of long, staple, fine fiber cotton in the world. Albini is cultivating the Giza 47 and 87 cotton, which are classified graded varieties of cotton.

“The Sri Lankan market wasn’t quality conscious and the people weren’t quality minded about the fabric.

Albini Group produces the best shirt material and we being the market leaders in the country, intend spreading awareness for Sri Lankan men who shop abroad, that quality could be purchased here as well. Raising the bar for producing a shirt is not easy and we are in the process of doing that.

The cotton is produced and materialized by state-of-the-art technology.

Five to ten percent of the turnover from the revenue is invested for updating the technology used,” Fouzul Hameed, Managing Director, Hameedia's said.

Albini provides an impressive array of shirt fabrics in all three major markets: high-end bespoke, made-to-measure and ready to wear. Hameedia’s service includes made to measure, customized shirts within two weeks, where the required material is imported.