Lidewij Edelkoort
Lidewij de Gerarda Hillegonda Edelkoort, often called Li, (born 29 August 1950) is a Dutch trend forecaster, someone who anticipates future fashion and design trends. She has been the Founder and Chief Executive Officer of Trend Union since 1986. Early life Edelkoort was born on 29 August 1950 in Wageningen, The Netherlands. Her parents are Jan Edelkoort and Hillegonda van der Spek. She attended the Academy of Fine Arts, Arnhem, receiving a bachelors degree in Fashion in 1972. Career Edelkoort began her career as a fashion coordinator at the Amsterdam department store De Bijenkorf. After finishing her degree at ArtEZ, in 1975 she relocated to France, where she set up as an independent trend consultancy. She soon created the consultancy 'Trend Union', a trend forecasting service based in Paris. Trend Union provides bi-annual trend forecasting books for the fashion and design community with colour and lifestyle information. She then founded Studio Edelkoort, a consultancy bureau, and opened two offices in New York City (Edelkoort Inc) and Tokyo (Edelkoort East). In September 2015 she was hired to oversee a new textile design program at Parsons School of Design, where she currently serves as Dean of Hybrid Studies. She has helped to