Designers Look to Lectra for New Ways to Create
A few dozen apparel designers got a glimpse into the future of design when representatives of technology company Lectra debuted the company’s new Kaledo design software during a May 21 event at the Elevate Lounge in downtown Los Angeles.
What designers saw was a world without sketch pads and pre-packaged software. In place, they saw the 3-D animated storyboards and limitless data-storage space for hundreds of designs. At the click of a mouse, they could create silhouettes in dozens of fabrics and prints while sharing their creations with staff and supply-chain partners.
French company Lectra, which maintains its regional office in Cypress, Calif., spent six years and $15 million developing Kaledo, the heir apparent and successor to the company’s Prima Vision and U4ia applications.
As the emphasis on fast fashion and speed to market became more of a priority, Lectra created a system that eliminated a lot of the wasted steps that take place in the design process. It’s similar to what the company did when it created its Fashion PLM (Product Lifecycle Management) system.
“I sometimes call this DLM for design lifecycle management , ” said J i l l Simmons, Kaledo businessdevelopment manager for Lectra. “We figured how to cut out the time in the supply chain. Now, we are doing it with design.”
The Kaledo range of products features Kaledo Collection, Kaledo Print, Kaledo Knit and Kaledo Weave. There’s also Kaledo 3-D Trend, created with the help of Microsoft Corp.
Simmons said Kaledo eliminates a lot of the importing of files and revisions, as everything is Internet-based and on a single platform. In the Kaledo Collection module, for example, designs—along with combinations of styles, components and materials—are automatically saved, and any resulting changes are immediately reflected throughout the collection.
Phillipe Cornillot, chief executive of French innerwear maker PMC Lingerie, was among the beta testers of Kaledo and said the system has eliminated more steps than he envisioned. “Our company’s added value is design. We show our clients our exclusive designs based on documents developed with Kaledo Collection, and, consequently, we can sell without having to make samples and take orders, even before the products are actually finalized,” he said.
Simmons said most of the feedback at Lectra’s demo events has been positive.
“Most of the time, it leads to full-blown demos. It gets the design community talking with each other, too, and that’s important,” she said.
Some of the designers at the Los Angeles event had concerns about cost. But because the system is modular, pricing could be as low as $4,000 for certain modules, Simmons said.
For more information, visit www.lectra.com/design. —Robert McAllister
