LVMH takes Viva Technology 2024 visitors into its Dream Garden

A must rendezvous for all the players in the innovation space, the 8th edition of VivaTech runs from May 22-26 at Paris Expo Porte de Versailles.

A founding partner of VivaTech, LVMH is once again showcasing innovations from its Maisons and startup ecosystem to help craft the future of luxury.

Day 1 – May 22 – Welcome to The Dream Garden!

The 8th edition of VivaTech had barely opened its doors and visitors were already flocking to LVMH’s Dream Garden. Resonating with LVMH’s mission, The Art of Crafting Dreams, the Dream Garden is a unique journey to the heart of innovation at the Group, a crossroads where tech, craft, creativity and sustainability all meet.

Decked out in LVMH’s signature deep blue and beige colors, the eco-designed pavilion features meticulously hand-crafted paper foliage. Some 13 LVMH Maisons are on hand to present 19 different innovative solutions that support their quest for excellence.

Dreams of excellence powered by AI and GenAI…

Dior Couture sets the tone the moment you step into this enthralling garden. Exquisitely worked models and vast screens come alive in front of you to show the multiple ways AI and GenAI are being deployed to elevate products, helping create display windows, anticipating logistics flows, performing visual searches – sales advisors can instantly identify a Dior product shown in a photo – or personalizing products.

Dior is also presenting Astra, an AI platform that aggregates customer comments from multiple channels – Goggle reviews, product pages, interactions with customer service, satisfaction surveys, live shopping sessions and more. Astra integrates this ocean of data to identify emerging trends or issues and monitor the consumer pulse in real time.

Nearby, Loro Piana invites you to try Silhouette, an interactive experience that leverages AI to create your digital doppelganger and try on Loro Piana clothes that match your style and morphology.

Head across the pavilion past the Dream Tree and enter the universe of Louis Vuitton, which is spotlighting the Extraordinaires AI-Configurator. This AI tool helps client advisors elevate the in-store customer experience. Using a photo of the customer or prompts, this virtual assistant can suggest products that are perfectly matched to the customer’s style and needs.

 … Plus exceptional immersive experiences

Virtual reality (VR) and augmented reality (AR) are powerful tools to immerse visitors in the brand universe and take the customer experience to an exciting new level. One example is TAG Heuer’s enhanced golf experience for Apple Vision Pro. And RIMOWA invites visitors on a virtual reality discovery of its products, also via the Apple headset.

Nearby, Hennessy is showing off Ampelos, a VR-powered grape vine pruning simulator. This enables training in this centuries-old skill – essential to the health and lifetime of the vines – regardless of the weather.

Guerlain is wowing everyone with a new multisensorial immersive experience that blends, audio, 3D video and scents. Visitors slip on a VR headset equipped with fragrance diffusion and smell iconic Guerlain fragrances while watching dreamlike landscapes designed by AI. The design of the landscapes is inspired by the creative notes of the Maison’s perfumer, Delphine Jelk, recounted in the soundtrack.

… Partnerships signed too

LVMH this morning announced a renewal and extension of its 2019 strategic partnership  Alibaba, the leading e-commerce and technology company in China, designed to further push the boundaries of the luxury experience in China.

With this deepened partnership, LVMH will increase its omnichannel, technology and data presence in China, leveraging Alibaba Cloud Technologies, including its innovative solutions driven by AI and generative AI and its Tmall luxury e-commerce site.

May 23  – Day 2 – Startups take center stage 

Startups were ready for their close-up during the second day of VivaTech. The high point was the eagerly awaited ceremony for the seventh LVMH Innovation Award, recognizing seven startups whose innovative solutions hold great promise for the future of the luxury industry.

After examining a record 1,545 applications from 89 countries, the jury awarded the top prize to Chinese startup FancyTech. Bernard Arnault presented the LVMH Innovation Award during a ceremony hosted by Swiss humorist  Marina Rollman.

Addressing a packed room, Bernard Arnault underscored the shared values that unite the LVMH Group and startups: creativity, excellence, entrepreneurial spirit and a commitment to positive impact. The Chairman and CEO of LVMH then evoked the sporting spirit of this historic Olympic year for France, encouraging startups to take inspirational cues from athletes: “If you want to succeed, whether you’re a startup or a major corporation, you need the same mindset as a high-level athlete, each and every day, and for the long term. Because this is just the beginning of the journey.”

Stéphane Bianchi, LVMH Group Managing Director, emphasized the pivotal role played by startups in the Group’s innovation ecosystem. “You, the startups we partner with, are our main partners for innovation and excellence,” he stated.

A winner that unlocks the power of GenAI for human creativity…

FancyTech, which also won the LVMH Innovation Award in the Immersive Digital Experiences category, utilizes generative artificial intelligence (GenAI) to create very-high-quality immersive videos from 3D models and brands’ creative briefs .

“This prize is a dream come true,” said a visibly moved Morgan Mao, co-founder of FancyTech. “We’re going to continue to innovate, applying the power of AI to offer the best possible experiences. In a world that’s changing at such a fast pace and with technologies developing so rapidly, we need to remember that AI should always be about supporting human creativity.” 

… perfectly aligned with LVMH’s vision

“As the leader in our industry, we have a responsibility to promote uses of AI that are both ethical and judicious, meaning centered on people,” commented Gonzague de Pirey, LVMH Chief Omnichannel and Data Officer during the awards ceremony.

LVMH Group Chief Information Officer Franck Le Moal noted that  “LVMH believes that GenAI will transform our creative processes and help us be more efficient in a host of areas such as clienteling, marketing or supply chain. We aim to accelerate our use of GenAI and we think the startups here today will be instrumental in helping us.”

Unique trophies designed by Dior with input from GenAI

For the first time, all the trophies presented at the LVMH Innovation Award were created with support from GenAI.

Designed by the Dior visual merchandising team, the trophies feature a design inspired by the LVMH pavilion “Dream Garden” concept. AI was integrated at each step in the creative process, contributing a source of inspiration thanks to a harmonious fusion of human creativity and technological innovation. Each piece – a glass tree with a unique iridescent play of colors – celebrates the exceptional craft of Murano glass blowers.

To showcase and protect the grand prize trophy, Louis Vuitton created a bespoke trunk, drawing on the Maison’s heritage and expertise in crafting special order trunks.

Inspiring talks

On the main VivaTech stage, Sephora CEO Guillaume Motte joined Enrique Martinez, Chief Executive of Fnac Darty, to talk about the future of retail. Noting that Sephora was deeply committed to bringing all its customers around the world an exceptional omnichannel experience, Guillaume Motte emphasized that bricks and mortar stores are absolutely essential for the beauty brand. “These are magical places, the beating heart of Sephora,”he said. Addressing an audience of new technology players, Guillaume Motte also underlined the essential role played by people in retail in general, and at Sephora in particular. “People are the essence of retail. Technology has to serve our teams, helping them be more efficient, not replacing them.” He illustrated this with a perfect example: AI has huge potential to support sales advisors and drive large-scale personalization of the experiences enjoyed by Sephora’s more than 65 million loyal consumers.

May 24  – Day 3 – The Maison of All Victories on the podium

LVMH created a special space within its captivating Dream Garden to spotlight initiatives by its Maisons for the Olympic and Paralympic Games Paris 2024, of which the Group is Premium Partner.

Visitors get a first-hand look at the official outfits designed for Team France for the Opening Ceremonies of the  Olympic and Paralympic Games Paris 2024 by Berluti, as well as the bespoke Torch Trunk  created by Louis Vuitton and of course the medals designed by Chaumet.

In the heart of The Dream Garden LVMH presents The Maison of All Victories, a microverse featuring the quintessence of the partnership between the Group and Paris 2024. This immersive 3D platform is an invitation to explore the multiple dimensions of this partnership over the coming three months.

The Maison of All Victories opens its doors

After visiting the social wall on the first floor – featuring all the social network posts of the Group and its Maisons, the second floor celebrates The Maisons and a behind-the-scenes look at their special creations. Visit Louis Vuitton’s historic workshops in Asnières where the special trunks for the Olympic torch and medals were crafted, or the creative studios at Berluti and Chaumet. Photos, videos and clickable 3D models recount the fascinating stories behind these exceptional creations.

Wait, there’s more! Take the elevator up to the third floor to discover The Athletes, a compelling journey into the world of the exceptional athletes who are LVMH ambassadors for the Olympic and Paralympic Games Paris 2024. These exceptional competitors share their thoughts and inspirations, from swimmer Léon Marchand and wheelchair tennis champion Pauline Déroulède to paracyclist Marie Patouillet and the others.

The Maison of All Victories will reveal more surprises in the coming weeks. New rooms and an entire additional floor will open to showcase other facets of the partnership between LVMH and Paris 2024. Reflecting the LVMH Group’s eco-responsibility commitments, The Maison of All Victories, although one of the largest ever 3D sites rendered in WebGL, weighs in at under 15MB.

Sustainable fashion in action

Invited to speak during a round table on sustainable fashion, Patou CEO Sophie Brocart honed in on the importance of traceability of materials for both customers and the Maison. “We work closely with Fairly Made, which traces the entire product journey,” she noted. “Tools like this are indispensable if we want to reduce our environmental impact.”

While the fashion industry has made considerable progress on the path to greater sustainability, a host of challenges remain. Among the most essential, Sophie Brocart continued, is heightening customer awareness. “My dream is that people will view the carbon impact of each garment the same way they look at the amount of sugar in food. This would make it crystal clear that for the health of the planet, we need to keep our clothes longer!”

On the nearby LVMH Dream Garden stage – which hosted over 70 talks over the past three days – Alexandre Capelli, LVMH Group Environment Deputy Director and Kevin Germanier, Creative Director and Founder of Germanier, presented the 100% upcycled fashion collection Prelude.

This is LVMH’s first collection crafted entirely using unsold materials and stock from its Maisons. “With Prelude we’re breaking a taboo within the Group by using unsold products which we completely disassemble, rendering them unrecognizable,” says Alexandre Capelli.

Commenting on photos of the collection, Kevin Germanier shared insights into his creative practice, noting that it took materials from seven different pieces – two jackets, two skirts, two dresses and a bathrobe – to make a single bomber jacket. “With this collection we’re exploring an entirely new realm of craftsmanship that you could call ‘the art of undoing’,” he smiled.

When luxury goes gaming

Sapna Parikh, Chief Data Officer of Kendo, the LVMH beauty brand incubator, took part in a round table on how the luxury space and video games are interacting. “We’ve very naturally linked up with gamers,” she explained, “because building a brand is about building communities. And gamers have established vast and incredibly loyal communities.” 

Noting that playing the same video game is an extremely powerful collective experience – not unlike being fans of the same sports team – Sapna Parikh was delighted to see the level of engagement sparked when Fenty Beauty launched a virtual experience on the Roblox gaming platform. “In just four weeks Fenty Beauty engaged with two million gamers, each of them connected for over 43 minutes. And we saw our number of followers on YouTube multiplied by six!”