Kering CRAFT unveils 1st cohort, spotlights China’s creative talent

What happened On March 30, global luxury group Kering announced the 10 fellows of its inaugural CRAFT residency. The cohort includes three jewelry designers — Longhong Ziwei, Xu Hao, and Yu Gengyi — and seven fashion designers — Cai Jiaen, Hu Nan, Qi Yueqi, Wang Fengchen, Wei Donghui, Xia Rong, and Zhong Zixin. Last November, during the eighth China International Import Expo, Jing Daily published an in-depth report on the residency program. At the opening ceremony of the Kering pavilion at CIIE, Chief Executive Officer Luca de Meo signed a memorandum of understanding with Shanghai Fashion Week to officially launch the residency. The program is designed to foster closer connections between Chinese and international creative communities through initiatives spanning Milan, Paris, and Shanghai, while accelerating the development of China’s next generation of designers. Since the residency program launched in December 2025, it has attracted applications from more than 100 Chinese designers. In March 2026, a rigorous selection process was jointly conducted by the program's advisory board — composed of leading international experts from the luxury, fashion, and creative industries — together with Kering and Shanghai Fashion Week. Candidates were assessed across multiple dimensions, including creativity and originality, craftsmanship and product excellence, growth prospects, and the embodiment of future luxury trends, with the aim of ensuring that the final cohort is truly representative of the diversity and strength of China's emerging creative talent. Inside the luxury advisory board shaping China’s next designers Cai Jinqing, President of Kering Greater China, said of the fellows: “We are grateful to the Kering CRAFT Advisory Board and Shanghai Fashion Week for their invaluable support in selecting this inaugural cohort of 10 exceptional fellows. Their creative passion, distinct perspectives, outstanding abilities and exceptional potential embody China’s new generation of creators. We look forward to meaningful learning and cultural exchange during their residency, and to further strengthening the richness and diversity of the CRAFT creative community together.” The Jing Take For years, China has been cast primarily as a growth engine and consumer market in the global luxury landscape. Kering’s residency, however, signals something else — not a commercial bid to secure talent, but a deeper form of empowerment, rooted in its established creative ecosystem. In the past, Chinese designers were mostly “seen” on the international stage — invited to shows, covered by media, picked up by buyers. But visibility is, by nature, passive: you stand in the spotlight while someone else controls the switch. The shift lies in access. Kering’s residency brings Chinese designers into the decision-making core of top-tier creative systems — not as participants, but as talents to be incubated, invested in, and systematically developed. Notably, the 10 fellows reflect this shift. Their work carries distinctly Chinese elements and Eastern philosophy, yet speaks a sophisticated global language. This blend of local originality and international relevance resonates with today's younger consumers. Gen Z no longer buys symbols — they ask: What’s the brand’s cultural foundation? Does it truly honor craft? Through the residency, Kering brings these emerging designers and their cultural narratives to the forefront, letting the creative process speak louder than marketing or celebrity endorsements. Why Demna joined Kering’s Chinese designer mentorship program As Demna, Gucci’s artistic director and a member of the residency advisory board, notes, “The creativity, innovation, and technical know-how in China are something I have always been fascinated by. I am excited to support the next generation of Chinese creatives and see how they will help shape the future of fashion.” Recognition and support from the world’s top creative decision-makers is certainly encouraging. But a deeper question arises: why devote so much energy to this initiative when the luxury sector is slowing and Kering itself faces pressures? While peers remain focused on capturing existing market share, Kering is using the industry’s current adjustment period to nourish the creative soil for the next decade — not by hoarding talent, but by empowering the new generation of designers through its mature and robust creative ecosystem. To this end, the group will open up its long-cultivated resources and bring in industry leaders to share their insights with the fellows. Kering’s long-term strategy for nurturing Chinese luxury design talent This investment itself reflects a distinctly countercyclical logic. Its essence lies neither in chasing the next trend nor in locking in talent ahead of time, but in a belief in the long-term value of creativity — and in the willingness to keep planting for the future even at the industry’s low point. For Chinese designers, this means they are no longer treated as marketing symbols at the height of the cycle, but as co-creative partners worthy of genuine, long-term development during a period of transformation. In many ways, this strategy also underscores Kering’s commitment to the Chinese market and the foresight behind it. In the long term, this strategy will not only create profound strategic value for Kering, but also inject significant momentum into the development of the global industry. Through the residency, Kering is bringing some of China’s most promising emerging designers into its orbit — talents who may in the future collaborate with the Group as advisers, develop capsule collections, or even go on to become creative directors within its Houses; equally, this experience may help their own brands reach a new level of maturity. It is precisely this range of possibilities that positions Kering in an irreplaceable role on the global creative map: both as a catalyst for Chinese design’s path onto the world stage and as a bridge for East-West creative dialogue. As these designers travel between Milan, Paris, and Shanghai, a new creative paradigm is clearly emerging. Over time, as more Chinese designers enter the system, the country’s role in the global luxury landscape will continue to evolve. Yet this is only the beginning. Whether this pioneering cohort will usher in a new era of Chinese design remains a question only time can answer. The Jing Take reports on a piece of the leading news and presents our editorial team’s analysis of the key implications for the luxury industry. In the recurring column, we analyze everything from product drops and mergers to heated debate sprouting on Chinese social media.

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Kering CRAFT unveils 1st cohort, spotlights China’s creative talent