Le Puy
Capital of the French department Haute Loire. It is especially renowned for the traditional lacework that bears its name. Le Puy lace has a peculiar weave whose origin dates back to a young girl, Isabelle Mamour, who in 1407 is supposed to have created a dress for the Black Virgin to celebrate the famous statue’s jubilee that year. Lace-making rapidly spread through the region and in the middle of the 17th century, after conquering Paris and the royal court, laces began to be exported to South America thanks to a missionary, Franµois-Régis, who was later canonized and made the patron saint of lace workers. The first mechanical loom was introduced in 1893, which led to a huge expansion in output. The region counted 120 lace factories and 120,000 lace workers. From 1925, the Laurence family practically had the monopoly on lace products manufactured in Le Puy, enabling it to get through (though not without difficulty) the crises brought by the Wall Street Crash in 1929, World War II and the social upheavals of 1968, when part of women’s protest rejected embroidered brands and underwear. In the late 1980s, George Laurence (from the family’s fourth generation) introduced the mechanical spindle and won back prestigious customers (Lacroix, Balmain, Chanel, Chloé, and also Petit Bateau and La Perla), as well as conquering several foreign markets. Today Dentelles Laurence employs 25 people working 75 looms, but, since the fall of the Berlin wall, the countries of Eastern Europe have invaded the market with goods at very cheap prices, once again endangering the survival of Le Puy’s lacemakers.