For Albert Kriemler, creative director of Akris since 1980, inspiration often strikes while gallery hopping.

As a teenager, Albert Kriemler grew up traveling to fabric fairs with his family, founders of the Swiss fashion house Akris, and occasionally attending the fashion shows of Yves Saint Laurent, whose legendary art-inspired collections brought Vincent van Gogh, Georges Braque and Piet Mondrian to life on the runway.

Is it any wonder Kriemler, creative director of Akris since 1980, frequently turns to art to nurture his creativity?

His zesty fall 2026 Akris collection, for example, was the fruit of a collaboration with Colombian artist Olga de Amaral, whose large-scale textile works, often covered in gold or silver leaf, emboldened him to stretch beyond his usual comfort zone of luxurious understatement and go all out with shine, color and texture.

He first drew a direct line between his fashions and art with the brand’s first Paris runway show in 2004, which was inspired by the colors of Swiss-French painter Félix Vallotton.

It wasn’t long before Kriemler was collecting art, befriending artists — and occasionally lobbying artists to partner with him on a collection, open-sourcing his creative methods with them.

Kriemler certainly went all-in with de Amaral, visiting the 94-year-old for several days at her home in Bogotá, soaking up her wisdom about her craft.

“I found out that when you get involved in an artist’s work and how she does art, that you get a much broader base for inspiration. You learn how she thinks about color, how she thinks about light, how she thinks about proportion,” he says.

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