LVMH has partnered with the Institut Français de la Mode to establish a research chair focused on the intersection of creativity and technology. The world’s largest luxury group wants to understand how creative minds engage with emerging tools, particularly artificial intelligence, as the technology promises to reshape the fashion design process in ways both subtle and profound.
The partnership also reflects a growing recognition across the luxury industry that AI adoption cannot be left to technologists alone. The most successful implementations will be those that emerge from dialogue between engineers and artisans, not from either group working in isolation. LVMH’s willingness to fund basic research on this question suggests the group sees creative technology not as a cost center but as a source of competitive advantage.
The research chair will examine how designers, pattern makers, and artisans interact with digital tools throughout the creative process. Rather than treating AI as a replacement for human creativity, the program positions technology as a collaborator — one that may accelerate certain workflows while leaving room for the manual intuition that luxury craftsmanship depends on.
IFM, which has produced some of the most influential designers working in Paris today, brings academic rigor and a direct pipeline to emerging creative talent. The school’s curriculum already integrates digital design tools alongside traditional atelier training. This partnership formalizes research into how that balance should evolve.
For LVMH, the initiative serves multiple purposes. It burnishes the group’s reputation as a patron of education and innovation, provides early access to the next generation of design talent, and generates proprietary insights into how technology is reshaping creative workflows across its portfolio of more than seventy houses. The findings could influence how the group structures its design studios and invests in creative technology.
