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Lucía Benítez was born on January 3rd 1984 in Montevideo, Uruguay, and since she was a little girl knew that she wanted to do something that allowed her to work with his creativity. This way, in 2004, she stared the Industrial Design Centre of Montevideo (Today EUCD), to do the Designer career specialized in textile and fashion.While completing his final year at University, she worked in a Knitwear factory, where she was responsible for the development of collections and products for major national and international brands.In December 2007 she presented her final collection, Volver which together with other selected, participated in the first edition of Pasarela Punta del Este, an international fashion event that took place in February 2008 at Conrad Hotel.In March of 2008 Lucía enters to the Product Department of a tailoring leader Trading Company. This work led her, in addition to travel and acquire useful knowledge, to make the “click” that helped her to find more creative horizons. This way, she started to create, along with his colleague and friend Lucrecia de Leon, Laurel project.The end of 2009 was challenging for Lucía. Nowadays, she wonders from where she got the time and the energy to do so many activities. Perhaps it was the alignment of the stars, the support of many people, the accumulation of years of learning and moving feelings or maybe it was a bit of everything. The truth is that even working in the Trading Company, developing Laurel and devoting most of his free time working for his Thesis, she entered the Lumina 4 design competition sponsored by the Punta Carretas Shopping with her collection called Resolana. Lucía was in the top 5 finalist and received a special mention by the jury. This second price awarded a trip to Sao Paulo for her to attend to Fashion Week SPFW, summer 2010.In August 2010, Lucía gets her title with the Thesis Nintai, developed with Mercedes Arocena. Nintai was selected to be part of the trends report in international design competition ITS. Also became the image of the first edition of MoWeek, a major fashion event and reference in Montevideo, attracting more widespread and new recognition.Today, consistent with his hyperactive personality, Lucía divides her time among being an entrepreneur with Laurel, working as a designer at Manos del Uruguay, teaching design at EUCD and a lot of other new projects. For her the limit is on what we are capable of imagining. Read Less

Manos del Uruguay was founded in 1968 and is a non-profit social organization which has provided jobs for craftswomen living in Uruguay rural areas.In Manos, garments are designed and knitted -mainly with wool yarns- for the local market and for renowned international brand-name clothes such as Ralph Lauren, Marc Jacobs, Stella McCartney and DKNY among others.During 2009, and after a long and exhaustive evaluation process, Manos del Uruguay was accepted as a member of the World Fair Trade Organization WFTO, which operates in 70 countries and brings together more than 350 organizations, 100% committed to Fair Trade.Laurel is a condiment.A condiment is a sauce or seasoning added to food to impart a particular flavor or to complement the dish. Those are often pungent in flavor and are used in fairly small quantities. Therefore, accessories are to clothing as condiments are to food.Under this premise, born Laurel, a brand specialized on women's accessories which combine author design with the use of Uruguayan raw materials and domestic labor. Our philosophy involves the constant assessment of the quality and warmth in everything we do. We also believe in designing form inside, appreciating heart and intuition rather than pure trend.We propose a cutting edge brand, based on the combination of three factors: innovation, good design and quality. We emphasize on handmade products and its exclusivity, without forgetting about researching into new technologies and processes constantly.Uruguay is a country whose economy is based on the production of goods and services from natural resources. Because of its cattle-breeder profile, some of our nation most exported products are meat, wool, leather and milk. Within this framework, Laurel´s collections are made of leather and wool, this way, quality is always guaranteed.In September 2009, Laurel project, along with the sponsorship of the CUI (Chamber of Industries of Uruguay) and AJE (Association of Young Entrepreneurs), was submitted to the ANII (National Agency for Research and Innovation) within the call to draft Innovative Young Entrepreneurs. In this way Laurel obtained the support of the ANII during the first year of the project. Read Less

Nintai – Selected as image of the 1st edition of MoWeek Presented on Agust 2010, Nintai was Lucia´s Tesis Project made together with her classmate and colleague Mercedes Arocena.This work was selected to be the image of the first edition of MoWeek (Montevideo Fashion Week www.moweek.com ). Nintai also was part of the Trend Report in the 10th edition of the ITS contest (International Talent Support www.itsweb.org ). In addition, by the end of 2010 Nintai was selected to participate in the exibition “About a Change” as part of the art program of the World Bank, promoting the work of Latin American artists and designers.Laurel – Awarded with the ANII support in 2010Laurel project (www.laurel.com.uy) was selected by the ANII (National Agency of Investigation and Innovation) to be part of the 2010 financial support program to uruguayan young entrepreneurs. Resolana - Winner of the second prize in Lumina 4.In 2009 Lucia enrolled -with her collection called Resolana- in the 4th edition of Lumina, the most prestigeous desing competition in Uruguay. she was selected as one of the 5 finalist and in March 2010, after showing the complete collection in front of the jury, Lucia was awarded with the second prize of the competition. Read Less