At New York Fashion Week, designer Kate Barton unveiled her latest collection with an innovative twist, merging high fashion with cutting-edge artificial intelligence. In collaboration with Fiducia AI and IBM, Barton introduced a multilingual AI agent built with IBM watsonx on IBM Cloud, offering guests an interactive and immersive runway experience.
The activation allows attendees to identify pieces from the collection in real time using a Visual AI lens powered by IBM watsonx. Beyond recognition, the tool answers questions in multiple languages via voice and text and enables photorealistic virtual try-ons, effectively creating what Barton describes as “a portal into the collection’s world” rather than deploying artificial intelligence for novelty alone.
Speaking ahead of the show in an interview with TechCrunch, Barton emphasised that technology has long been part of her creative thinking. She expressed interest in blending the real and the unreal to spark curiosity, explaining that today’s technology expands the world around the clothes and shapes how audiences enter the story behind a collection. For her, the objective was not automation but deeper engagement — creating moments that make viewers pause and look twice.
Ganesh Harinath, Founder and CEO of Fiducia AI, explained that the activation relied on IBM watsonx, IBM Cloud and IBM Cloud Object Storage. He noted that while model tuning was complex, the real challenge lay in orchestrating the system into a seamless, production-grade experience. The collaboration marks Barton’s continued experimentation with AI, following earlier technological integrations in past collections.
The broader fashion industry remains cautiously curious about artificial intelligence. Barton observed that many brands are quietly using AI in operational capacities but hesitate to showcase it publicly due to reputational concerns. She compared the hesitation to the early days of e-commerce, when luxury houses debated whether they should even launch websites — a question that later evolved into how effectively they used them.
Industry voices suggest that while AI adoption is growing, much of its current use remains surface-level, such as chatbots or internal productivity tools. Barton, however, envisions a future where AI enhances prototyping, visualisation and production decisions, while preserving the human craftsmanship that defines fashion. She has made it clear that technology must elevate, not erase, the people behind the work.
According to industry projections shared during the conversation, AI in fashion could become mainstream by 2028, with deeper operational integration by 2030. Leaders within IBM Consulting highlighted how connecting inspiration, product intelligence and real-time engagement can transform AI from a novelty feature into a strategic growth engine.
Yet for Barton, the ultimate goal remains clear. The future of fashion, she argues, is not automated fashion. It is fashion that embraces new tools to heighten craft, deepen storytelling and broaden access — without diminishing the human creativity that makes garments meaningful. At NYFW, that vision stepped confidently onto the runway, offering a glimpse of how art and algorithm might coexist in the next chapter of design.
