This project explores how architecture, minimalism, and machine intelligence can merge into a new design language for contemporary menswear. SHELTER / STRUCTURE is a full visual identity and campaign built for a speculative AI brand that treats clothing as engineered protection — quiet, sculptural, and profoundly human.

This project began as an experiment in authorship. Could an art director design an entire fashion house — not through traditional production, but through AI-driven image systems, conceptual direction, and cinematic storytelling?

The answer became SHELTER , a self-initiated brand and campaign that grew into a three-chapter exploration of human design logic. Each season expanded the same world — an aesthetic framework built around structure, isolation, connection, and release.

My role covered everything: from defining the visual DNA to crafting the campaign language, storyboarding film sequences, and curating the tonal evolution across collections. The result is a complete creative ecosystem that behaves like a real luxury label — built entirely from thought, vision, and machine collaboration.

As Art Director, I built everything from the ground up: concept development, visual strategy, creative direction, shoot planning, and campaign execution. The goal wasn’t just to “design images,” but to architect an ecosystem — a believable brand universe that feels timeless, cinematic, and eerily calm.

BRAND NAME: SHELTER

BRAND ESSENCE: "AI-native fashion that explores the intersection of algorithmic precision and human emotion through landscape and architecture"

POSITIONING:

Category: Avant-garde technical wear

Inspiration: OAMC (Luke Meier's functional minimalism)

Differentiation: First fully AI-designed fashion brand that treats AI as co-creator, not just tool

TARGET AUDIENCE:

Primary: 25-40, early adopters, tech-forward creatives

Secondary: Fashion intellectuals, collectors of experimental design

Psychographics: Values innovation, sustainability, post-human aesthetics

ALGORITHMIC DESIGN - AI as creative partner

ENVIRONMENTAL DIALOGUE - Fashion in conversation with landscape/architecture

FUNCTIONAL POETRY - OAMC-inspired utility meets emotion

POST-DIGITAL CRAFT - Where code meets couture

Layout: open space and heavy asymmetry to mirror the garments’ architectural proportions. Photography: cinematic isolation — half portrait, half structure. Silhouettes framed by desert light or glass reflections.

Every decision — from cropping to color grade — was built to sustain emotional neutrality. The system had to make the viewer lean in rather than shout for attention.

How do you express an AI-born brand without leaning on clichés of chrome and circuitry? The challenge was to humanize technology through emotion, texture, and restraint. The brand needed to live between two worlds — digital precision and organic imperfection.

The task: to create a campaign that could exist beside OAMC, Jil Sander, or The Row — but with a conceptual twist that hints at machine consciousness and functional beauty. The outcome had to feel luxurious, not futuristic. Quiet, not sterile.

I made the decision to treat landscape and architecture as collaborators. Brutalist concrete. Windswept moorlands. Desert expanses. Coastal rocks. These aren't backdrops—they're participants in the design process. Each environment shapes the algorithm's output, creating garments that belong to specific places while transcending location entirely.

SHELTER makes fashion that:

Questions before it answers - Explores rather than assumes

Functions before it decorates - Purpose drives form

Evolves beyond human bias - Discovers what we couldn't imagine alone

Exists in physical reality - Digital tools, wearable results

The core idea became “Shelter as structure. Structure as identity.” Every garment acts like a form of architecture — protection, geometry, and skin. The campaign interprets this through isolation, reflection, and monumental landscapes.

Three creative pillars defined the direction:

Architecture – clean silhouettes, brutalist and desert backdrops.

Human scale – individuals dwarfed by space, emphasizing stillness.

Contrast – matte black fabric vs sunlight, silence vs motion, AI precision vs natural texture.

Visual tension drives the story. The models aren’t styled as personalities; they’re almost architectural figures — shadows with posture and presence

SHELTER is a prototype—an experiment in what fashion becomes when we surrender control without abandoning direction. When we invite the machine to co-create while maintaining human values. When we design for a world where artificial and natural intelligence are partners, not rivals.

This is post-digital craft. This is algorithmic poetry. This is fashion for the threshold.

Gathered reference imagery: brutalist architecture, landscape photography, OAMC collections

STEP 2: PROMPT ENGINEERING

Developed structured prompts combining:

Style references (OAMC, Lemaire aesthetic)

Environmental context (concrete, moorland, desert)

Technical parameters (composition, lighting, color)

Generated 4-8 variations per concept Selected strongest outputs Refined through prompt adjustment

Curated final selections Organized into capsule narratives Designed film-strip presentation format

Applied consistent visual language Developed storytelling framework Created campaign concept

KEY INSIGHT: AI accelerates iteration, but human vision drives curation

It started with a question I couldn't answer.

I was standing in front of a brutalist building in Berlin—all raw concrete, geometric precision, monumental scale. The kind of structure that makes you feel small but somehow more aware of your body, your movement, your presence in space. I took a photo, thinking I'd use it as inspiration later.

That night, I fed the image into an AI model with a simple prompt: "Design a coat for someone standing here."

What came back shocked me. Not because it was perfect—it wasn't. But because it showed me something I would never have imagined on my own. The algorithm had interpreted the building's VERTICAL lines as sleeve proportions, the concrete's texture as fabric weight, the void between pillars as negative space around the body. It wasn't just a coat. It was a conversation between architecture and garment that I, as a human designer, would have been too constrained by convention to attempt.

That's when I realized: AI doesn't think like we do. And that's exactly why we should work with it.

I decided to push the experiment further. What if I created an entire brand where AI wasn't just assisting—it was co-creating? Where every collection emerged from dialogue between human art direction and algorithmic generation?

But I needed constraints. AI without boundaries produces chaos. So I established rules:

RULE 01: Every collection must dialogue with specific environments

RULE 02: The aesthetic language must reference OAMC's functional minimalism

RULE 03: Every piece must be physically producible (no impossible fantasy)

Then I chose four landscapes that represented different relationships between human and environment:

Brutalist architecture — human-made environments that feel inhuman

Natural terrain — organic systems that follow their own logic

Elemental extremes — places where nature is overwhelming, sublime

Urban construction — cities as geometric frameworks for life

Each landscape would generate a capsule. Each capsule would explore what clothing means in that specific context.

VOID emerges from dialogue with brutalist architecture—raw concrete, geometric precision, monumental scale. The algorithm was trained on Tadao Ando's spatial philosophy and Le Corbusier's béton brut, then asked to generate garments for bodies moving through architectural void.

The result: all-black silhouettes punctuated by stark white layers. Oversized coats that create negative space around the body. Draped constructions that transform human form into walking sculpture. High collars that frame the face like building facades frame sky.

Every piece in VOID asks: what happens when we remove decoration and focus purely on volume, proportion, and the space between fabric and skin?

Architectural coat with white underlay panels

Draped cape with asymmetric closure

Wide-leg trousers with structural waistband

Layered turtleneck system

MATERIALS: Heavy wool melton, technical cotton, bonded jersey

COLOR PALETTE: Black 100C, Stark White, Concrete Grey

INSPIRATION: Brutalism, minimalist sculpture, urban void

WEARERS: Those who understand that empty space is never truly empty

TERRAIN was generated through AI analysis of topographical maps, satellite landscape imagery, and organic growth patterns. The algorithm studied how erosion creates texture, how fields shift color seasonally, how weather leaves traces on surfaces.

The collection translates these natural processes into patchwork graphic prints, soft color gradients from sage to mint to pale blue, and utilitarian details that reference outdoor gear. Each piece feels like landscape made wearable—geological layers compressed into fabric, terrain mapped onto textile.

The graphic elements aren't decorative—they're algorithmic interpretations of specific coordinates, weather patterns, and elevation changes. Wearing TERRAIN means carrying a piece of Earth's data on your body.

Patchwork shirt-jacket with topo-graphic prints

Multi-pocket utility coat in sage green

Technical windbreaker with gradient panels

Wide-collar shirt with abstract landscape graphics

MATERIALS: Organic cotton canvas, ripstop nylon, brushed twill

COLOR PALETTE: Sage, Mint, Pale Blue, Cream, Mustard Yellow accents INSPIRATION: Topography, field systems, geological strata, outdoor utility WEARERS: Those who see clothing as documentation of place

MONOLITH explores the most extreme landscapes: where rock meets ocean, where desert meets sky, where human scale confronts natural monumentality. The AI was given a constraint: design only in white and cream, using draping and layering to create impact without color.

What emerged were sculptural, almost ceremonial pieces—flowing coats that move like water, draped constructions that reference ancient robes and futuristic uniforms simultaneously. The occasional red accent acts as signal flare: a human marker in an inhuman landscape.

These aren't garments for everyday life. They're garments for threshold moments—standing at cliff edges, walking into desert, confronting the sublime. MONOLITH is fashion as ritual, as armor against the overwhelming beauty of nature.

Floor-length draped coat with irregular hemline

Layered cape system with asymmetric panels

Oversized shirt-coat with extended sleeves

Wrapped silhouette with structural shoulders

MATERIALS: Heavyweight linen, wool crepe, technical silk blends

COLOR PALETTE: Cream, Warm White, Chalk, Bone, Red accent details INSPIRATION: Coastal geology, desert monasticism, ceremonial dress, sci-fi mysticism

WEARERS: Those who need armor for beautiful, dangerous places

CONSTRUCT began with a question: what if buildings could move? The AI analyzed brutalist architecture, deconstructivist theory, and tailoring history to generate garments that capture architectural principles in fabric.

The result is structured tailoring with unexpected proportions—coats with displaced shoulders, blazers with exposed construction, trousers with architectural volume. Every seam is visible, every structural decision exposed. These pieces don't hide how they're made—they celebrate construction as aesthetic.

The neutral palette (sand, stone, concrete, taupe) references building materials while remaining wearable. CONSTRUCT is for those who see fashion as spatial design, who understand that dressing is architecture at body scale.

Deconstructed double-breasted coat

Oversized blazer with displaced collar

Wide-leg trousers with pleated volume

Structured overshirt with exposed seams

MATERIALS: Wool gabardine, technical twill, bonded cotton COLOR PALETTE: Sand, Stone, Concrete Grey, Taupe, Warm Beige INSPIRATION: Brutalist architecture, deconstructivism, Japanese tailoring, ind

CAMPAIGN: "RENDERED LANDSCAPES"

CONCEPT: Film-strip aesthetic showing AI's iterative process— multiple variations suggest algorithmic testing, contact sheet authenticity, process over perfection

ART DIRECTION PRINCIPLES:

LOCATION AS CHARACTER Brutalist architecture & raw landscapes as collaborators, not backdrops

MOVEMENT IN STILLNESS Static poses made dynamic through repetition and variation

HUMAN + DIGITAL Real models, AI-designed clothes, physical locations— bridging digital and material worlds

MONUMENTAL MINIMALISM OAMC's restraint meets sci-fi scale

REFERENCES:

OAMC campaigns (Luke Meier's direction)

Yohji Yamamoto's architectural photography

Caspar David Friedrich's romantic landscapes

Contact sheets from classic fashion photography

WHY THIS MATTERS

CULTURAL RELEVANCE:

✓ AI is reshaping creative industries—fashion must respond

✓ Offers new narrative beyond nostalgia and historical revival

✓ Explores post-human aesthetics for post-digital world

DESIGN INNOVATION:

✓ AI enables exploration beyond human reference limitations

✓ Rapid iteration leads to more refined design outcomes

✓ Discovers forms at intersection of calculation and intuition

BUSINESS VIABILITY:

✓ Lower sample costs through digital prototyping

✓ Faster time-to-market with AI-accelerated design

✓ Data-driven approach to trend forecasting and demand

✓ Pre-order model reduces waste and overproduction

SUSTAINABILITY:

✓ Digital-first design reduces physical sampling waste

✓ Limited production prevents overstock

✓ Transparent supply chain through documentation

✓ Quality over quantity philosophy

COMPETITIVE ADVANTAGE:

✓ First-mover in AI-native fashion positioning

✓ Authentic integration vs. marketing buzzword

✓ Appeals to tech-literate, future-focused consumers

CHALLENGE 01: Consistency Across Generations AI can produce wildly different outputs from similar prompts

SOLUTION: Developed strict prompt engineering framework with:

Locked color palette references

Consistent composition rules

Location-specific parameters

Style strength controls

CHALLENGE 02: Technical Feasibility AI-generated designs might not be physically producible

SOLUTION: Referenced existing OAMC/technical wear construction in prompts Consulted with pattern makers on feasibility Prioritized realistic proportions and silhouettes

CHALLENGE 03: Avoiding "AI Aesthetic" Clichés Risk of generic, overly digital-looking outputs

SOLUTION: Heavy emphasis on film photography references Grounded designs in physical landscapes Used brutalist/minimalist style references Focused on wearability over spectacle

KEY LEARNINGS:

AI is powerful for rapid iteration, but requires strong curatorial vision

Constraints (color, location, style) lead to better outputs than open prompts

The art director's role is more important than ever—curation is creation

Successful AI work requires understanding both technology AND craft

PHASE 02: RENDER_02 Collection (Next Season)

Explore different environments: arctic, jungle, industrial zones

Introduce accessories and footwear

Collaborate with AI researchers on new generative models

SCALING STRATEGY:

Move from concept to limited production run

Partner with ethical manufacturers

Develop custom AI tools for customer co-creation

Build community of early adopters and brand advocates

COLLABORATION OPPORTUNITIES:

Partner with AI artists and researchers

Explore sustainability tech (material innovation)

Potential retail partnerships with forward-thinking spaces

Educational content: workshops on AI in creative practice

LONG-TERM MISSION: Position PROTO as the leading voice in AI-native design— not just in fashion, but across creative disciplines.

Prove that human-AI collaboration creates work that neither could achieve alone.

Build a brand that questions, explores, and evolves at the speed of technology while maintaining human values at its core.