Discover Foundry, the new fashion tech innovation laboratory, launched by the fashion school IFA Paris, last September. From March, the first budding entrepreneurs of its fashion tech startup program will be incubated there. Interview of its director Peter Jeun Ho Tsang.

By Ludmilla Intravaia

Le Boudoir Numérique : On September 23rd, you launched Foundry, the fashion tech innovation laboratory of IFA Paris fashion school. Why did you create this lab, dedicated to fashion technology ?

Peter Jeun Ho Tsang, director of Foundry powered by IFA Paris : Our mission is to pioneer fashion tech in Paris and beyond. Fahion is quite slow compared to other industries and needs to change to modernize. Technology can stimulate it to do things differently, wether it’s design, production, supply chain or buying, for instance. Tech needs to be embrace to improve the system for better efficiency, different consumer experience, etc. Fashion and tech, often apart, need to work together to make it happen. Lots of fashion companies know that they need to collaborate with technology but they dont’ know how to do it. The hardest thing for them is finding the right tech talents to work with.

How can your lab be useful in that matter ?

Foundry will enable its community members, entrepreneurs, startups and students to work alongside, in order to help them to make leaps in fashion and innovation. In this this lab where ideas become a reality, we want to nurture startups with innovative fashion projects. One can interact with Foundry in many ways. The general public can come here to get an insight of how the future of fashion is going to look and discover new technologies. For instance, you can step inside TG3D Studio’s 3D body scanner, which scans you in three seconds and then creates your own little digital mini-me (see pictures below – on the right, first picture, Vongai N. Ruzive, business developper at Foundry, AN).

You can also join Foundry as a community member. Desk spaces are available for entrepreneurs and startups inside the lab. Our 400 square meters comprises of co-working spaces and a tech demo room, an inspirational place, in partnerships with IBM, where startups will be able to present their work to clients or potential partners (discover the lab, in pictures, below, AN).

We also have an experimental makerspace with cutting edge technical equipment, like pattern digitizer, 3D printer, laser cutter, etc., provided by our sponsors, such as TG3D Studio or N-Hega (discover the makerspace, in pictures, below, AN).

In the lab, one can have access to our network of individuals in areas from fashion, tech through to entrepreneurship. We also have a startup program, a 6-month incubator aimed at budding entrepreneurs and early stage startups specializing in fashion tech, innovation, sustainability and future craft. We give them a unique platform to make it happen, with an eco-system of experts, partners and academics that will allow them to push the boundaries of fashion tech. We are hoping to have around 10 to 15 startups, in the beginning of our program, next March (see info below, AN).

Will the students of fashion tech courses, newly created at IFA Paris (see info below), have access to the lab ?

Yes. We have the fashion tech innovation program, one year postgraduate course to give the students both fashion and tech skills and knowledge to be confident to work in R&D or innovation departments and to create fashion tech solutions, products or startups. We also have a one-week short inspirational course to provide the students foundational knowledge of the fashion tech discipline. The fashion tech students will have access to Foundry space to work on their research and development of fashion technologies. I would like Foundry to be this unique eco-system where engineering and tech students would meet fashion students, fashion brands, startups and experts to begin the conversation about fashion tech that is not done, for the moment, in Paris. It is super important that we enable that to happen.

Peter Jeun Ho Tsang, director of Foundry powered by IFA Paris, December 4, 2019, in Paris (portrait : ©Lionel Samain for Le Boudoir Numérique 2020)

What do you mean by that ?

Paris needs to open a dialogue about fashion tech. I was quite surprised that the big fashion capital in the world was behind compared to London or New York on that front, that there was no hub in Paris dedicated to fashion tech. It's important because you have all the main fashion houses here and the french tech, for instance at Station F, that is already encouraging it. Paris can be traditional sometimes, which can be a barrier. I am not saying that we do not need craftsmanship, far from it, it's not about being wrong or right but to push fashion tech further, in terms of the thinking behind it. It's about collaborating and experimenting, in fact.

* The fashion tech innovation lab (FTI Lab) Foundry is situated in IFA Paris fashion school, 18 – 24 Quai de la Marne, 75019 Paris. Open to the public from Monday to Friday, from 9AM to 6PM.

* IFA Paris website is here. Its page dedicated to Foundry is there.

* Foundry website is here. Application for the startup program, beginning in March 2020, can be made here (deadline : February 29th 2020).

* Fashion tech courses at IFA Paris :

- Postgraduate diploma : fashion tech innovation (next intake September 2020, see program here)

- Future fashion tech short course (next intake July 2020, see program there)

* Learn more on Foundry with this video below.