Zegna

Zegna (officially the Ermenegildo Zegna Group) is an Italian luxury menswear group founded in 1910 as a wool mill in Trivero, in the Biella Alps, now a hamlet of the municipality of Valdilana in the province of Biella. From a mountain wool-cloth factory it has grown into one of the few Italian fashion houses still in the hands of the founding family, listed on the New York Stock Exchange since 2021, and it is one of the best-known industrial stories of Piedmont: around the plant the founder built social services, roads and woods that shaped an entire valley.^[1]

The Trivero wool mill

On 11 May 1910 three Zegna brothers, Edoardo, Mario and Ermenegildo, together with Costanzo Giardino Vitri, formed the company "Zegna e Giardino", with capital of 32,000 lire paid in equal shares and the stated business purpose of "making woollen cloth".^[2] Ermenegildo, born in Trivero on 2 January 1892 into a family of weavers documented in the area since the Middle Ages, had graduated as a textile technician from the Regia Scuola Professionale in Biella in 1909 and was still a minor: to join the company he had to be legally emancipated.^[1] In 1915 the outside partner, and then Edoardo, left the firm, which took the name Lanificio Fratelli Zegna di Angelo, with Mario and Ermenegildo as its sole owners.^[2]

During the First World War Ermenegildo was called up as a medical orderly and served for about a year at the military hospital in Turin, before being discharged to return to running the factory, which was meanwhile producing grey-green cloth for the Royal Army.^[1] The company's declared aim was to produce top-quality menswear fabrics, focusing on the choice of the finest raw materials.^[3] In 1928 the founder obtained permission to drop the double surname Zegna Baruffa in favour of simply "Zegna", for specific commercial reasons: one stage in what his biography calls the "battle for the brand".^[1]

The 1930s: brand, honours and social works

In the 1930s Zegna founded a series of related companies (ADAM in 1931, Caesar in 1934, then SATIS and DEA, and in 1941 Raiontex for rayon fabrics) and in 1938 travelled to New York with his son Aldo, where the Zegna Woollens Corporation was established.^[1] He was awarded the Cross of Merit for Labour in 1935 and, in January 1940, on Mussolini's initiative, received the title of Count of Monte Rubello di Trivero.^[1] In the village everyone called him "monsù Gildo".^[1]

Alongside the wool mill rose the Zegna social works: the first indoor swimming pool in the Biella area, a cinema-theatre, a clinic with a maternity ward, housing for employees and the Villaggio Zegna.^[1] The maternity ward at the Centro Zegna, opened in 1939, has recorded eight thousand births.^[4] In 1938 work began on the Strada Panoramica Zegna, designed to break the isolation of the mountain villages and climb up to Bielmonte, where in 1952 Zegna himself set up a ski resort about fifteen kilometres from Trivero.^[1] From 1929 onward, about 500,000 trees, mostly conifers, were planted on the slopes around the factory.^[1][5]

From fabrics to garments

In 1944 the group took over STIMA, a Turin knitwear firm; between 1944 and 1945 the founder's sons Aldo, an engineer, and Angelo officially joined the company, which became Lanificio Ermenegildo Zegna & Figli.^[3][1] On 18 November 1964 the Australian Wool Board declared the mill the largest consumer of Australian superfine wool.^[1] The founder died on 18 November 1966 and is buried in the cemetery he had built at Craviolo, along the Panoramica.^[1]

Under the second generation the company moved from fabric to finished product: in 1968 garment-making began with IN.CO Industria Confezioni, and tie-making with Orsini. Sales subsidiaries followed in Europe, the United States, Mexico, Asia and Australia; the first single-brand boutiques opened in Paris in 1980 and in Milan in 1985.^[3] In 1999 the group acquired Lanerie Agnona, specialised in women's fabrics, and in September 2002 formed ZEFER, a 50-50 joint venture with the Salvatore Ferragamo group.^[3]

The third generation and Wall Street

In 1993 the family's third generation created Oasi Zegna to protect the environment around Trivero, and in 2000 the Zegna Foundation was established, to which the group allocates 5% of net profits every year.^[5] Gildo Zegna, the founder's grandson, has been chief executive since 1997.^[6] The group has since strengthened its textile supply chain, acquiring the Tessitura di Novara (silk) in 2009, the Bonotto wool mill in 2016 and the Dondi knitwear firm in 2019.^[5] In 2018 it acquired 85% of the New York brand Thom Browne for around 500 million dollars, and in April 2023 took on the long-term worldwide licence for Tom Ford clothing and accessories.^[7]

On 20 December 2021 Ermenegildo Zegna debuted on the New York Stock Exchange through a merger with Investindustrial Acquisition Corp, a special-purpose acquisition company (SPAC) linked to Andrea Bonomi: the initial market capitalisation was about 2.4 billion dollars, the family retained 66% of the capital, and the group was present in 80 countries with 296 directly operated stores.^[8][9] It was the nineteenth Italian company listed on the NYSE; unlike other Italian fashion houses that had allied with foreign competitors or been sold, Zegna chose the American stock exchange to finance its growth while remaining independent.^[8] On the day of the debut, Gildo Zegna commented on the listing as follows.^[9]

"I'm moved. A dream is coming true"

According to Il Sole 24 Ore, after the listing Investindustrial held 13% and the free float stood at 21%.^[9]

Today

In 2024 the group recorded almost two billion euros in revenue and 184 million euros in profit, with about 7,100 employees; the family controls around 60% of the shares.^[6] From 1 January 2026 Gildo Zegna is executive chairman, the group's chief executive is Gianluca Tagliabue, previously chief financial officer, while Edoardo and Angelo Zegna, of the fourth generation, lead the Zegna brand as co-chief executives.^[6]

In Trivero the wool mill is still operating. Next to it stands Casa Zegna, with a collection of nineteenth-century sample books and a permanent exhibition on the group's history; the Sala Quadri displays canvases by Ettore Olivero Pistoletto devoted to the art of wool in the Middle Ages.^[10] The group's historical archive, covering the period from 1910 to 2012, occupies about a thousand linear metres and includes around 100,000 photographs.^[3] Oasi Zegna today covers about 100 km² of the Biella mountains crossed by the Strada Panoramica Zegna, with free admission.^[11]

Sources

1. Treccani – Dizionario Biografico degli Italiani —
2. Oasi Zegna
3. Rete Archivi Biellesi
4. Fondazione Zegna — 28 April 2020
5. Ermenegildo Zegna Group
6. Il Post — 24 November 2025
7. Modaes Global
8. Sky TG24 — 20 December 2021
9. Il Sole 24 Ore — 20 December 2021
10. Oasi Zegna
11. Oasi Zegna