Department of New Realities' AR-assisted Moncler book is a technological triumph

Coats are good, aren’t they? Up there with the scent of a bonfire, cold turkey sandwiches eaten in front of a special edition of Who Wants to be a Millionaire? on the evening of Christmas day, coats are one of the best things about winter. We get the feeling that the team at Italian fashion brand Moncler like coats even more than we do. Their latest release sees them working with powerhouse publisher Rizzoli and The Department of New Realities (DPTNR), Wieden + Kennedy’s Amsterdam-based future-forward creative unit, on Moncler Genius a large-scale and lavish look at eight of Moncler’s Genius collections. Oh, and it uses AR really, really well.

A central part of the project, AR was “part of the original inception of the book,” say DPTNR’s Anita Fontaine and Geoffrey Lillemon. “The team at Moncler were pushing to make this book very, very special and after a brainstorm, we felt that AR could transform the way people interact with both a luxury brand and printed matter. Almost like [the way] jewellery is an accessory to the body, we thought of this app as a luxurious digital accessory to the book.”

More than just a collection of very high-end coats compiled into a glossy coffee table-friendly book — and yep, those Craig Green jackets, the Michelin Man ones that the internet went wild for a few months back are here to be gawped at in all their OTT glory — DPTNR were keen to use new technology to celebrate the history and heritage of Moncler.

“AR is all about spatial design and revealing hidden dimensional 3D landscapes – triggered by a specific design element IRL. When we gaze through books we’re imagining environments and scenarios and technology allows us to bring these visions to life in a more hyper-sensorial way,” says DPTNR. With that in mind, they wanted to reflect Moncler’s outdoor-focused approach, noting that “there’s something so fitting about bringing to life these extreme nature scenarios in an AR context.”

The pair tell us that, “The work of Zach Lieberman and I8 reality are great initial experiments and interesting,” when it comes to innovative AR. “The work of Metaverse Makeovers and Ines Marzat are cool speculative starting points to an approach that’s more about beautifying reality or making it more absurd like with the Hotstepper app by Nexus.”

You want to know what those AR experiences are don’t you? Of course, you do. Unfortunately, that’d be telling. Go buy a copy.