Kering yesterday announced partnerships for its new Kering Academy for Excellence, a network aimed at developing talent for the Italian group’s fashion and jewelry brands, which include Pomellato, Gucci, Bottega Veneta, and Brioni. The academic initiative is headed by Pomellato CEO Sabina Belli.
Eight Italian educational institution signed memos of understanding with Kering Academy for Excellence: Associazione Culturale Olga Fiorini (ACOF), Milan’s AFOL Moda, Politecnico del Commercio e del Turismo (CAPAC), Galdus, HModa, ITS Cosmo, Istituto Modartech, and Schola. The collaboration will be housed at the Valore Italia campus in Milan’s Innovation District, Kering said.
“This initiative…is structured as a nationwide education ecosystem,” Kering said in a statement. “The signing of the first memorandum of understanding…marks the start of a collaboration based on the sharing of expertise and educational pathways.”
“The signing of the memoranda of understanding represents the first step in building a stable collaboration with the world of education,” said Diego Montrone, academic director of Kering Academy for Excellence and CEO of Galdus. “We wanted to involve institutions and organizations that are widely distributed across the territory and cover different academic profiles…to bring them closer to the real needs of the sector, creating continuous dialogue between students, teachers, and maisons.”
Kering said the academy’s curriculum will redefine the training approach in the luxury sector’s four traditional pillars—apparel, men’s tailoring, leather goods, and jewelry—with the development of cutting-edge skills related to technology, artificial intelligence, and new materials.
“Luxury is undergoing a profound metamorphosis: the traditional concepts of rarity and ‘handmade’ are opening up today to new, broader and more complex meanings,” Belli said in a statement. “With Kering Academy for Excellence, we do not simply want to pass on techniques inherited from the past, but to transform traditional crafts into dynamic, contemporary professions that are strongly future-oriented.”
The Academy’s advisory body will be called the Think Tank and also be headed by Belli. Other Think Tank members are brand strategist Andrea Batilla; Politecnico di Milano head of jewelry and accessory design Alba Cappellieri; Pinacoteca di Brera director general Angelo Crespi; Altagamma director Stefania Lazzaroni; Lampoon magazine editor-in-chief Carlo Mazzoni; Kering jewelry division production and supply chain COO Andrea Raselli; Milan’s deputy mayor for culture Tommaso Sacchi; and Istituto Universitario Salesiano di Venezia professor Arduino Salatin.
Kering announced it was establishing the academy at an event at the Gucci Archive in Florence. The company already has training centers for some of its brands, but said these new partnerships strengthen that effort.
(Logo courtesy of Kering)
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