Together with our partners

The heartbeat of design will run through Paris in September. And Paris Design Week will be the place to talk and share with your peers, show off your projects, and spot new talent. Our first partners this year are living proof that design is a fundamental necessity for a successful company. They’ve placed it front and center in their strategy. Just a few months before Paris hosts the Olympic Games, sports equipment specialist Decathlon, a firm that has been designing its own products since 1986, reminds us that they have one of the biggest design studio in France. In addition to their 860 product engineers, 300 designers work at Decathlon, designing beautiful, functional, and innovative activewear and sports equipment in ten different design locations throughout France. The other thing that’s unique about this firm is its adoption of a responsible approach to providing 100% eco-designed products by 2026, with a lower impact on the planet and using less energy. At Paris Design Week, innovation is the name of the game for them. From September 7-11, Decathlon will offer an exhibition that reveals pieces that are rarely on display, demonstrating the uniqueness of their products and solutions. On Rue de Turenne in the Marais, everyone will be surprised to learn how much this brand follows and even predicts evolutions in society.  

On a very different note, Paris Design Week hosts the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia as part of one of the most ambitious cultural projects in the world. It’s about turning the AlUla archaeological site, which is on the UNESCO World Heritage list, into a natural park that celebrates art in all its forms, and specifically, design. Located in the northwest of the country, between sandstone cliffs, the oasis of AlUla offers stunning landscapes and contains the vestiges of the Incense road, as evidenced by Aramaic and Dadanite inscriptions. The development of this destination is being carried out in partnership with France. Jean Nouvel will be designing a cave hotel on the side of a canyon. Arts AlUla has launched an international design competition for the design of retail products inspired by the cultural heritage and oasis landscapes found here. The AlUla Design Awards, for which applications will close on March 30th, will be given at a gala dinner in Paris in September. For the duration of Paris Design Week, an exhibition will present the ten finalists, as well as the design program at Arts Alula. 

And finally, for the first time, the ACE Education group is partnering with Paris Design Week to teach the public about the wide variety of design professions that exist. This group has 42 campuses in France with 7000 students, and they work with 4000 partner firms. In addition to schools dedicated to sports management, luxury marketing, and hospitality professions, this group also runs the ESDAC school, higher-education institutions specialized in graphic design and space design, product design, fashion design, and animation, with 11 different campuses in France. Besides a Talk at the Factory space, students are currently preparing a major immersive and interactive exhibition for Paris Design Week. Talent from every training course will be participating, from design to sports, to students from the ENAAI by ESDAC, specializing in graphic design and animation, which is also part of this educational group. Set/installation design, innovation, mapping … For these students, Paris Design Week will be one big hands-on exercise. The ESDAC will also participate in the DESIGN sur cours competition.