This summer, in heavy news linked to the consequences of global warming, the house Saint Laurent hit the headlines with its parade organized in Morocco. The reason: an event lasting a handful of minutes, which will in fact have altered the landscape and the country’s resources forever… While the brand’s managers then strived to defend their recycling and carbon offsetting efforts, the public could not forget the six kilometer road, built for the occasion in the middle of the Agafay desert. Beyond commenting on the scope of the controversy, I think it is more than important to wonder about the future of ephemeral installations – strongly acclaimed by luxury players – in a society that aspires to more of ethics and responsibility.
Tip of the iceberg: at the same time, almost in the same place, Louis Vuitton organized the launch of a High Jewelry collection, and Cartier its worldwide meeting.
Ephemeral and Durable: (too) obvious nonsense.
What has only a “short duration” can it “last a long time or take into account the future of the planet”? A fortiori, if we stick to the strict definitions – borrowed here from the Petit Larousse – the answer seems simple. Producing a space, an installation, or even an object, with the concern of destroying it after a few minutes or a few days, does indeed seem rather untenable. And yet… Removing any notion of immediacy, ephemerality, eventualization would philosophically amount to accepting only the most durable lives, productions, and choices, and at the same time rejecting any form of testing and learning, annihilating in passing any effort of creativity. Values that are nevertheless dear to human beings – certainly polluting, and totally ephemeral – that we are, and fundamental in what has constituted the major progress of our society.
Are sobriety and creativity (re)reconcilable?
It is understood that the imperative of creativity in all things cannot however constitute a free pass to destroy our planet. The challenge now is to find how to combine the surprises, emotions, and wonders that ephemeral installations and pop-up stores can arouse with the imperatives of sobriety, responsibility, but also exemplarity that are more than ever ours. Indeed, these appointments given by the brands punctuate our seasons and are so many privileged moments that allow us to connect emotionally to them, to their inspirations, to their universe. And it must be recognized that very often recourse to the extraordinary is the way chosen to guarantee a strong memorial imprint on the audience. The question is therefore the following: should the extraordinary, the marvelous be synonymous with the debauchery of energy, of matter or even of producing/transporting/using/throwing away? Wouldn’t there be sources of wonder to be created at the local level?
And tomorrow: to be able to dream without wasting?
If we don’t want to give up the ephemeral, how should we consider it tomorrow so that it can be better integrated into the new responsible standards?
Take the example of Dior. Last November, the French house marked time by inaugurating, in Dubai, an ephemeral store entirely built of natural materials using 3D printing technology and in collaboration with the Italian company WASP whose stated mission, is, modestly, to “save the world”. An initiative that is still too isolated, but which tends to prove that the sector can precisely set an example here too, by competing in creativity and ambition to rethink the fundamentals of the pop-up, but also to use it as an educational lever. with its customers, and promotions of innovative players in eco-responsibility, who precisely need this financial support to deploy.
If tomorrow pop-up stores no longer travel – taking advantage, in particular, of local resources -, the same should be done for products, the creation process of which could be completely redesigned to give them attributes specific to the where and when they would be designed. During the last Paris fashion week, Sébastien Meyer and Arnaud Vaillant, the talented creative duo at the head of Coperni gave us the masterful demonstration of a fashion that reconciles the ephemeral with the lasting. Through a happening with the iconic Bella Hadid, the purity of the device and the sobriety of the means used to create a dress undoubtedly open the way to new ways of creating and envisaging a brand event.