A novelty in the world of leathers that promises to be a real turning point. It took two years of research and experimentation for Malibù, the sheepskin-looking calf developed by Curtiba Industria Conciaria of Santa Croce sull'Arno (PI), founded in 1997 and now specializing in the production of leather through chrome and vegetable tanning. A novelty presented during the last edition of Lineapelle, it immediately attracted considerable interest, so much so that the company is already sampling it and expects it to go into production soon and have an excellent response from the market.
Very similar to sheepskin in terms of hand, feel, softness and specific weight, Malibu is the result of months of testing, and is made with a vacuum tasseled tanning that has the characteristic of not aging and remaining compact. It is an idea born on input from some customers, according to whom the stylistic and research part of the brands is moving toward sheepskin and lamb tassels. A first step was the creation of a calfskin tassel, which, however, did not represent a major innovation. Working on it, Curtiba found the right balance between the three processing steps, liming, tanning and retanning, which resulted in Malibu, the calf that looks like mutton.
The advantage of such a hide? Having larger sized hides available. In fact, the pieces of sheepskin are smaller than those of calfskin, which has a higher yield from the cutting point of view and thus embrace a wider merchandise sector: for example, with sheepskin only small bags are made, with calfskin even larger ones. Made in two variants, a 0.7/0.8 mm light one for clothing, and a 1.1/1.2 mm one intended for leather goods and footwear, at the fair we saw it in next season's colors: dark brown, olive green, sand and black. Currently, sampling is being done on black, the most acidic dye that is the most problematic, proving that it can be developed on any kind of color.
