Hermés

Art Direction, Creative Direction, UI

Hermés was opening its very first parfumerie in Brookfield Place in manhattan, and they reached out to Disruptive Media Lab to come up with a grand experience to celebrate this momentous occasion. The client ask for 2 things: an augmented reality app and a whimsical theatrical experience. The problem was we had never built an augmented reality app before. We were only a small in-house team, 1 producer, an art director, the founder, and a copywriter. 

The original invite for the event. Artwork (border) by Daniel Gordon. Opposite side of invite/artwork animates to fold up into origami with AR app.

•  Create an augmented reality experience that showcases a fragrance from each collection. Each Vignette should play into the whimsical world of Hermés.

•  Build an indoor/outdoor experience at Brookfield Place for invited guests and influencers who will attend the store opening event.

Well, where to start? The founder had seen a really great augmented reality zombie game created by a company who won awards. He reached out. Turns out they are all the way in New Zealand (Obstacle One), but we had them on stand by awaiting instruction. Now how do we build animated vignettes? We need animators. We hired 2 animators (1 remote, 1 contracting in the office) and 1 Unity lighting program specialist (In Canada) – (Obstacle 2). We poured through the library of Hermés parfum, we watched product videos, we spoke with the brand team in both NY and Paris and started to compile a mood board of sketches, swipe and some storyboards. This team knew what they wanted, revision after revision, finally we had a few ready to start on. I divided the workload between the 2 animators and set to work. I worked closely with both animators and the client revising the vignettes, once approved each animation was sent to the unity developer and then reviewed by me before being packaged and sent to the development team in New Zealand. I would hop on early morning calls to coordinate the asset, hand off with these guys and make sure they had everything they needed to get started. Soon after, we had a nice cadence of assets on the move. Development would share in a test flight release that I would then test with the triggers I had created. I’d then give feedback and the team would revise and adjust. The interface of the app was something the Hermés also felt strongly about, so they determined most of their own placement. They wanted something simple and easy to use.

Meanwhile, our producer was trying to put together a plan of action for the outdoor event on whimsy. What does that even mean?? I pulled swipe, and we pitched an elegant event idea. They would not have it; it needed more of the brand injected. Ok, I thought. I got weird with it. Horse head masks, jugglers, harps, floral curtains, we brainstormed all kinds of strange oddities. They loved it. We were on our way. The producer began hiring actors, waitstaff and a James Beard Award winning pastry chef.

Down to the wire I was coming in early, testing the product, hopping on calls, staying late to help animators. I even got up in the middle of the night to coordinate communication by myself for the final handoff to the client and app submission to the app store. I was on the phone with the Hermés paris headquarters and The New Zealand dev team. It all went to plan and the app released. Whew. A few gray hairs later.

The morning of the event, I got up early and headed to the grounds. We placed the AR trigger around the new store. Then, I helped the floral team install lacquered petals in a pattern to the entrance, carried boxes for the kitchen, and I sat behind the scenes all day as guests arrived, walkie talkie in hand ready to refill trays along the walk and handle odd jobs to make the event go smoothly. 

Above: The home screen, in-store map of Augmented Reality (AR) experiences and AR scan screen.

Below: Photos from the event, guests using the AR and enjoying the sensory walk to the store.

Above: The Hermés vault – contains artists featured by Hermés typically someone who has been chosen to do a store installation or window display.

Below: Photos taken by guests at the event.

The event went off without a hitch, and all the hard work paid off. The client actually enjoyed the work so much that they hired Disruptive Media Lab again for another event and were interested in adding new vignettes to the app. Even Jean-Claude Ellena, the creator of the parfumerie collections, attended the event and was seen laughing and enjoying himself. 

I think if I had to this project all over again, I now know the constraints of the technology better. There were a few things regarding the size of animations and targets that would’ve been nice to know upfront. But at the end of the day, I think as a band of misfit freelance team members, we worked well together and produced something that was fun that the client really enjoyed.