Never Judge a Book...

You can never tell a book by its cover.

~From Murder in the Glass Room

 

My post from yesterday needs a few revisions:

• The name of the company is spelled Bvlgari.
• The brightly lit creature on the outer walls of the Bulgari building is not a lizard, it is a serpent.
• Bvlgari is famous for its serpent necklace, shown in the picture above.  The necklace is the star of the Bvlgari 2012 Serpenti collection.
• The head of the serpent is on 5th Avenue, while the body wraps around the corner and up to the roof on 57th street.  The tail then come out of the roof on 5th Avenue and curves underneath the head.
• NYC Bvlgari's serpent is but one of three; the other two creatures are in Rome and Tokyo.
• The snake is 62 meters long and almost 30 meters high.  It has 80 scales, each over three feet tall.
• The serpent contains 120,000 LED lights and over 2000 meters of luminous tubing.
• The serpent has been a Bvlgari trademark for over 60 years.

All of that is fascinating, but the area in which I really missed the mark was in Bulgari's philanthropic giving.
Three years ago, Bulgari partnered with the Save the Children charity.  In 2009, the jeweler designed a silver ring specifically for their Save the Children campaign.  About 20% of the profit was donated to the charity.  This year, a new silver and ceramic ring was designed, selling for 390 euros; Bulgari donates 70 euros for every ring sold. Since the inception of this partnership with STC, Bulgari has donated over $20 million!!

The following information is found on the Bulgari website:

Each contribution of 70 euros will have a meaningful

impact on a child's education.  70 euros can provide:

Books for 18 children in Brazil

Setting up a school library in India 

Safe drinking water for one student and their family in Uganda

Training for 13 teachers in Indonesia

50 boxes of colored pencils for young migrant children in China

I salute Bulgari (and their dazzling "diamond" serpent) for their understanding that wealth brings certain responsibilities to the underdeveloped portions of this world that are "poor" by anyone's standards.  I certainly cannot afford to purchase anything in your store, but I greatly admire your commitment to giving back.