Biography
Lidewij (Li) Edelkoort is a Dutch trend forecaster who advises fashion companies and brands around the world in their business and sustainability practices, most recently focusing on textiles and circularity. She is also the dean of hybrid studies at Parsons School of Design in New York.
In 1975, after finishing her degree at ArtEZ, Edelkoort relocated to Paris, where she set up consultancy Trend Union, which provides bi-annual trend forecasting books for the fashion and design community. Edelkoort then founded Studio Edelkoort, a consultancy bureau, and opened two offices in New York City (Edelkoort Inc.) and Tokyo (Edelkoort East). In 2011, Edelkoort launched Trend Tablet, a website and social media platform.
She has helped shape products for international brands, with clients including Coca-Cola, Nissan and Douwe Egberts. In the beauty industry, Studio Edelkoort has developed concepts and beauty products for Estée Lauder, L'Oréal, Gucci and Lancôme. Edelkoort has art-directed, launched and published numerous magazines including Bloom, View on Colour and Interior View.
When Edelkoort presented her "Anti-Fashion" Manifesto at BoF’s VOICES in 2016, she offered a critique of an industry that, for all its fixation on setting trends, is stuck in the past. Now, the trend forecaster and futurist is the dean of hybrid design studies at Parsons School of Design and spearheads the school's newly accredited MFA Textile Studies programme.
Edelkoort was chairman of Design Academy Eindhoven from 1999 to 2008, and in 2011 helped found School of Form in Poznan, Poland. In 2003, she was named one of the “25 Most Influential People in Fashion” in Time magazine and the following year was named as one of the “40 Most Influential People in Design” by Icon magazine. The Dutch Royal Family named Edelkoort a Knight in the Order of Oranje Nassau in 2008 and, in 2014, she was awarded the Chevalier de l’Ordre des Arts et des Lettres by the French Ministry of Culture and Communication, in recognition of her artistic and literary creative contribution to France and international culture.