NICOLA Giuggioli – who, we might as well get it out of the way now, is Colin Firth's brother-in-law – designed his first solar panel at the age of 13. “It’s actually quite a simple device to build,” says the Italian Giuggioli.
“Mine was a very primitive model. It was a highly insulated box with serpentine pipes inside, closed with non-reflective glass and connected to water pipes. Water was going inside this box, became incredibly hot, and poured out the other side.
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| Mirror made out of recycled newspapers, S$76. |
“It was very, very big – a couple of meters by one-point-five. It worked, but I think the family used it just to make me happy.”
Today Mr Giuggioli, at the ripe old age of 28, is the chief executive of Eco Age, a trendy ecological store and consultancy on Chiswick High Road in West London.
And two members of the family that was so forbearing with his starter solar panel – Alessandro his brother, and Livia his sister and wife of Firth – are also involved in the business, as research & product executive and creative director respectively.
Firth and another friend, Ivo Coulson, are the other founding partners.
Besides being a shop for eclectic, planet-friendly products such as bamboo bicycles and egg-shaped recycling bins, Eco Age also offers advice on sustainable and cost-effective living solutions for the home.
Customers can see, touch and evaluate different technologies that maximise energy efficiency and have their questions – How do I choose a geothermal system?
Should I install a wind turbine? – answered by friendly, knowledgeable staff.
It does help that sometimes, Firth himself is behind the counter or minding customers.
“They don’t say it, but I guess some people do hang out there because of him.” says Mr Giuggioli, laughing.
“Colin has been always very, very important for us in terms of marketing. He’s also a very informed person, always able to answer questions. He’s been working at the till, that may be attracting some of our customers.”
(Alas, the dashing Mr Darcy himself, according to Eco Age’s publicist, is “on this occasion unable to accept an interview request”. Doubtless he is either busy filming, or promoting his two latest films, A Christmas Carol and the Tom Ford-directed, critically acclaimed A Single Man, for which he won the Best Actor gong at the Venice film festival. Or perhaps he is, as we speak, diving manfully into yet another bog.)
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| Natalia Pepe's Nora Pepe handmade carpet of pure wool flowers sewed onto a felt base, S$8560. |
“Colin was one of the initial investors,” continues Mr Giuggioli. “But he didn’t only invest the money and forget about it. He comes to the shop constantly. He tries to apply these solutions in his own house. He’s very aware of what's around in the market, what are the problems, what are the solutions. He’s been very supportive.”
Mr Giuggioli studied economics and business at the University of Rome but soon realised that a career in finance was not for him.
“Banking did not attract me at all. I was supposed to be very good at that, but it did not appeal to me, the mechanism of making money out of money. I was very good with numbers and math. I had part of my family working in banking and they were all pushing me to get that kind of work experience. But for me it was quite boring. I found a fantastic excuse, which was to run away to England to learn English, and I never went back.”
Mr Giuggioli has some firm words about where bankers should put their money.
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| Lucia clutch made with recycled bottle top, S$79. |
“A lot of financial institutions should stop using financial instruments only to make money and go back to investing in solid companies. One of the biggest causes of the credit crunch was that the money became completely disconnected from the people. Financiers should go back and take the risk – which is actually sometimes quite fun – of investing especially in businesses that are trying to do something ecologically sustainable, because in the long-term they are the most financially sustainable.”
Not that Eco Age is the sort of over-earnest, doomsday-driven entity that espouses hair-shirts and feelings of deprivation and guilt.
On that, Livia, who sources for the products and also has a career as a film director, is emphatic.
“First and foremost, we choose things that are beautiful,” she says.
“We have a lot of eco things that we decide not to stock because we don’t think they give the right message. People switch to an ecological object from an un-ecological one because it’s beautiful. The purpose of the shop is to show people that things that are stylish and sexy can also be ecological.”
Among her favourite things in the shop, she says, is a clutch bag called Luciana made from bottle-tops.
“It’s perfect for evenings. Every time I wear it, it’s the subject of conversation. It’s elegant and funky. It’s £35 so not very expensive.
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| Recycled fabric Christmas stockings, S$40. |
“We’ve also got an extraordinary tartan blanket made out of recycled plastic bottles. It’s soft, it’s really strange and I still don’t really get it. But it’s perfect for picnics, or even for the house, to put on a sofa. It’s perfect to give to your grandparents. And it’s only £12.”
Says her brother: “Everybody says we should stop buying, we should stop flying, we should stop doing everything.
My answer is: ‘Well, in the meantime, let's try to use things a little more wisely, with a bit more information.’ I don’t think everybody is going to stop buying. At least let’s do it in a way that is less bad.”
Mr Giuggioli says the store is “on its way” to being profitable and there are already thoughts of opening up other branches in Europe (probably Italy), the US and perhaps Asia.
The clientele is a good mix of people, he says, though on the retail side, about 60 to 70 per cent of the customers are women.
“We have women who come to buy cleaning products about once a week. They are more conscious of the home, they are generally more aware of their kids’ health and needs, so they’re shopping for that kind of thing. And Colin’s image might also attract more women than men, I have to say.”
