London, 21^st July 2021 – IBM and the British Fashion Council (BFC) collaborated to deliver improvements to the London Fashion Week digital experience, including, improved performance for visitors and designers as well as support for driving sales.  BFC is a not-for-profit organisation whose role is to strengthen British fashion in the global economy as a leader in responsible, creative business, that harnesses the collective power of the industry to enable sustainable growth in the global fashion economy.

IBM and BFC are committed to the next generation of retail and are eager to support the growth of new designers and brands in any way that can give them the best chance in an ever-changing market by applying innovation and technology to help them reach their audiences and drive revenue.

To kick start the project around London Fashion Week 2021, a team of experts from IBM iX—the business design arm of IBM Services—was quickly assembled. Using IBM’s learning from projects such as Wimbledon 2020 “The Greatest Championships” compilation and our work on the Mercedes-Benz Stadium in Atlanta, the team sketched out concepts. Agile project management, and continuous collaboration with IBM, the BFC teams and their third-party suppliers kicked in to ensure the industry and designers could tap into commerce in unique ways that support their digital growth.

The Project delivered a significantly Improved Digital Experience and has helped BFC to introduce their next-gen commerce capabilities. 

Specifically, for London Fashion Week in February 2021 and June 2021, IBM and BFC joined forces to:

• Introduce shopping capabilities on the London Fashion Week website by creating an interactive carousel which sends customers directly out to the Palmer//Harding website after browsing within the London Fashion Week page. 
• Support designers to drive visitors and sales to their websites via London Fashion Week, leveraging Fashion Week to grow their own digital journeys 
• Use the IBM Experience Orchestrator, to help London Fashion Week quickly deploy modern platforms and connect commerce adapters to grow their digital capabilities on the Cloud, and tap into new innovations
• Ensure that the web experience is not jeopardised as more and more designers upload digital content 

Tracey Gilbert, IBM ‘s UKI Leader, IBM iX said, “We are pleased to be working with the British Fashion Council to help them innovate to improve the digital experience of London Fashion Week, and support the incredible designers that showcase their work at London Fashion Week 2021. London is the hub of innovation, sustainability and creativity for fashion and we’re proud and excited to support their digital transformations as much as we possibly can.”

Clara Mercer, Communications Director British Fashion Council said: ““London Fashion Week is one of the Big Four international Fashion Weeks known for creativity and innovation. We are delighted to have worked with the IBM team to optimise the London Fashion Week website, making sure that designers showing as part of the event benefit from the platform, and the audience visiting the digital event has the best possible experience. We hope to continue to work with them as the platform evolves.”

Visit the first digital store front experience of London Fashion Week and see for yourself :https://londonfashionweek.co.uk/designers/palmerharding#shop.

About IBM

IBM is a leading global hybrid cloud and AI, and business services provider, helping clients in more than 175 countries capitalize on insights from their data, streamline business processes, reduce costs and gain the competitive edge in their industries. Nearly 3,000 government and corporate entities in critical infrastructure areas such as financial services, telecommunications and healthcare rely on IBM's hybrid cloud platform and Red Hat OpenShift to affect their digital transformations quickly, efficiently, and securely. IBM's breakthrough innovations in AI, quantum computing, industry-specific cloud solutions and business services deliver open and flexible options to our clients. All of this is backed by IBM's legendary commitment to trust, transparency, responsibility, inclusivity and service.

About BFC 

The British Fashion Council (BFC) is a not-for-profit organisation set up in 1983 with the role to strengthen British fashion in the global economy as a leader in responsible, creative businesses. It does this through championing diversity and building and inviting the industry to actively participate in a network to accelerate a successful circular fashion economy. The BFC promotes British fashion internationally and does so through fashion weeks, exhibitions and showcasing events. The BFC helps British designer businesses develop their profile and business globally and supports fashion talent beginning at college level, extending to talent identification, business support and showcasing schemes. The BFC Foundation (Registered Charity Number: 11852152) was created in 2019 for charitable purposes and grant giving; attracting, developing, and retaining talent through education and business mentoring. The BFC has donated £1,500,000 from the surplus that was generated from its activities over the past two years, including those generated from The Fashion Awards. Combined with the fundraising efforts of all its talent support initiatives and a call to BFC stakeholders to support fundraising to help businesses survive the COVID crisis, total donations of £3.2m have been received by the BFC Foundation to date. The BFC Foundation offers support to designers through four talent identification and business support schemes: BFC/Vogue Designer Fashion Fund, BFC/GQ Designer Menswear Fund, NEWGEN in partnership with TikTok and the BFC Fashion Trust. With the support of the BFC Colleges Council, the BFC Foundation offers BA and MA scholarships to students, as well as links with industry through design competitions and Graduate Preview Day. In 2020, the BFC launched the Institute of Positive Fashion (IPF), with the aim to help the British fashion industry lead in the goal to be more resilient and circular through global collaboration and local action.

The BFC showcasing initiatives and events include London Fashion Week Presented by Clearpay taking place every February, June and September; LONDON show ROOMs and the annual celebration of creativity and innovation in the fashion industry: The Fashion Awards.

For more information visit: britishfashioncouncil.co.uk / londonfashionweek.co.uk / instituteofpositivefashion.com 

Media Contacts

Emma Bennett
IBM UK External Relations
Emma.Bennett@uk.ibm.com

Michalis Zodiatis
BFC Head of Press
Michalis.zodiatis@britishfashioncouncil.com