From Sept. 7 to 11, 2023, French sporting goods retailer and manufacturer Decathlon will participate for the first time in Paris Design Week to showcase the expertise of its multidisciplinary design community. In the Decathlon Designer exhibition (18 rue de Turenne, 75004 Paris), both the public and interested parties can discover what goes on behind the scenes. This exhibition, staged by Atelier Craft, mixes iconic archives with the latest product designs and experimental concepts.
Decathlon was founded in 1976 and began its own product development back in 1986. Decathlon teams design 90 percent of the products sold on the retail chain’s shelves. Some of the products that have since become icons have changed sports practice, such as the fitness cube or, more recently, the 2Seconds tent, the easybreath mask, the rollnet or the inflatable windsurfer. Today, more than 500 designers worldwide create aesthetic, functional, technical and innovative sports products and solutions in design centers that are as close as possible to the people who run them.
The Decathlon Designer exhibition connects past, present and future through iconic archival pieces, current products and explorations. Visitors can discover prototypes nicknamed “monsters,” some of which will never reach the market, and a prototype conceived using artificial intelligence in “advanced design” and other research concepts.
