Doubleface in demand in Pielespaña

The 22nd edition of the Pielespaña International exhibition took place from January 17-20 with a 21% increase in exhibitors, mainly from overseas. Pielespaña appeared to be moderately busy, especially on the opening two days but recorded a slight fall in visitor numbers compared with 2002 to give 13,061. A total of 1,483 foreign visitors attended the fair from 55 countries and the highest number came from Türkiye. 'We have an expansion in exhibitor numbers of 9% and an exhibition area increase of 21% this year', Marta Bachs, director, Pielespaña, told Leather International. 'During the past year, we have been actively seeking more overseas exhibitors and this year we have two trade delegations from two regions of Italy and we have 15 companies from the Spanish Balearic Islands', she added. This year marked the third time that leather garment producers from the Balearic's had attended the fair, which also included their own catwalk fashion show called 'Balears és Moda'. Visitors to the fair were extensively from Spain. However, there were large numbers of Italian, Turkish and Chinese visitors attending. South Korean, French, UK, German and US visitors were also in evidence but in smaller numbers. Once again the latest doubleface, nappa, nubuck and suede garment leathers were shown at the exhibition fashion show for autumn/winter 2003/04 season. For the second year in a row, doubleface garments dominated the collections with nappa garments taking a back seat. Spain has a rich tradition of high quality small skin garment leather tanners. The prices of native merino and entrefino sheepskins are relatively low on the open market allowing tanners to produce doubleface leathers with an acceptable margin. The favourable price has allowed doubleface leather to become popular once again following high raw material prices of 2000 and 2001. The fair took place in hall 1 of the Fira De Barcelona, close to the city's Plaza España. In total, there were 182 national and foreign exhibitors. It is promoted by the Asociación Catalana Empresarial de Confeccionistas an Ante Napa y Doble Faz with the collaboration of COPCA (Consorci de Promoció Comercial de Catalunya), CEC-Fecur (Spanish Tanners' Association) and ICEX (Spanish Institute for Export Promotion).