On the occasion of the French Touch Vol. 2 at Galeries Lafayette, the event which highlights blue – white – red know-how, Thibault Henriet, founder of awen, a start-up specializing in generative artificial intelligence and Pascal Morand, Executive President of the Federation of Haute Couture and Fashion, returned to the challenges of technology at the service of fashion houses.

Support rather than replace. Unlike traditional so-called “analytical” artificial intelligence (AI) (which analyzes existing data to classify it or make predictions), generative AI invents. The direct impact is the acceleration and democratization of content creation. An innovation that is now being found within fashion houses, curious to make use of this tool which, far from wanting to replace creative people, presents itself more as a working partner.
A trend widely observed by Pascal Morand, Executive President of the Fédération de la Haute Couture et de la Mode and Thibault Henriet, CEO of Awen, a start-up specializing in supporting creation using artificial intelligence.

La French Touch : What is your assessment of the use of AI in fashion houses?

Pascal Morand : Artificial intelligence is developing extremely quickly, and in all the activities of fashion houses, as in the entire economy, whether it involves thinking or developing methods likely to support creation.

It’s the same for creation, communication, marketing and coordination. This is what I call the 4 Cs.

Thibault Henriet : In my opinion, we are currently in a still very exploratory phase of these technologies. Some fashion houses are not yet clear on possible daily use cases.

This is why we encourage them (especially creative teams) to explore, manipulate and try these tools. We must have an approach to test and learn ; which will allow everyone to define, discern and specify use cases that will be useful.

The French Touch: Can fashion take advantage ofAI ?

PM: When we talk about technologies linked to AI or generated by artificial intelligence, we see that beyond the aspects of rationalization, information management or structuring of information, there is also a dimension of generation of content: images, texts, sounds and it goes very quickly! However, these generative AIs will not replace designers but rather will accompany and support them in their creative process and allow them to achieve a form of augmented creativity.

TH : This question is at the heart of the creation of awen. To answer this, we went to meet creative professionals in fashion houses: ready-to-wear designers, leather goods, accessories, jewelry, beauty, marketing and even retail – all those and those who create the fashion experience today. The goal was to understand how the creative process took place, focusing on humans, without even talking about AI.

These discussions allowed us to highlight the fact that creative teams spend a lot of time generating and developing concepts, prototypes and projects which, for many, are shelved or, in the worst case, never see the light of day. This process generates fatigue since we must constantly renew ourselves, innovate and continue to create. It is with this observation that we developed awen, to support creation from inspiration to production, thanks to generative artificial intelligence.

The French Touch: C'that is to say ?

TH : When we create, the mind engages in mechanisms of research, sedimentation, association, synthesis and iteration until an idea is perceived as new enough to be developed. Generative AI algorithms, on the basis of their training data, make it possible to generate content, more or less similar in identity, to synthesize and develop it. At awen, we are particularly interested in the parallels that exist between the processes of the mind and those of these algorithms. This observation pushed us to consider AI as a tool suitable for helping creative teams in the research, development and formatting of ideas in image, text, video, 3D or even digital formats. audio.

Applied to fashion, this makes it possible to support design teams in the search for inspiration for product development, marketing teams in the development of campaigns, or even retail teams in the creation of experiences in order to increase desirability for consumers.

The French Touch: These soulful technologiesAre there also issues around data protection for fashion houses?

TH : It is both a challenge and an opportunity. A fashion house builds its value on its history, its heritage and its intellectual property: so many assets which are largely digitalized today. It is essential to protect this data so that it remains in the possession of the house. At the same time, they represent a real creative gold mine for teams. To reconcile intellectual property and AI, there are different solutions: the creation of models “ in-house » or the customization of pre-existing models and open-source through methods of fine tuning. This allows them to adapt to DNA while protecting it. At awen, we take care to place personalization, security, control and traceability at the heart of our product. Our tools are aligned with the creative requirements of the teams and the protection challenges of the company to support them on a daily basis.