Hermès Launches 'Innovation in the Making' Theme with Pop-Up University on Governors Island

In mid-February, Hermès hosted a day-long event in New York to unveil its annual theme 'innovation in the making' and announce the new location for its 2022 flagship store on Madison Avenue. The event took place on Governors Island at a pop-up university, where artistic director Pierre-Alexis Dumas and Lili Chopra, executive director of artistic programs at the Lower Manhattan Cultural Council, organized debates and lectures. Speakers included philosopher François Jullien, astronaut Dr. Peggy Whitson (first woman to command the International Space Station twice and record holder for most spacewalks by a woman), artist and performer Okwui Okpokwasili, and paleoanthropologist Ian Tattersall, who discussed human hand evolution and cave art from over 70,000 years ago. Dumas emphasized the house's balance between tradition and innovation, quoting his father Jean-Louis Dumas. The day concluded with a conversation between Dumas and Sir Jonathan 'Jony' Ive, designer of the MacBook, iPod, iPhone, and Apple Watch, who holds over 5,000 patents, discussing the Hermès-Apple Watch collaboration. In the evening, Hermès transformed its future Madison Avenue flagship into a wonderland called 'Heureka!' (Greek for 'I have found!'), featuring a whimsical laboratory with Groomakers creating machines from Hermès objects, saddle swings symbolizing the house's equestrian roots, and board games revealing the Birkin bag's manufacturing process.