FASHION MADE: Communicating in 3D at IKEA, with Dan Frith
In this interview, Dan Frith, IKEA’s 3D lead, shares his personal journey from being inspired by the original Tron film to a career spanning military flight simulation, gaming, and finally IKEA. He outlines the historical evolution of 3D at IKEA, from early vector graphics in the 1960s to the modern push for real‑time, mixed‑reality experiences. Frith explains how 3D moves beyond photorealistic replication to enable impossible visualisations, citing IKEA Place and catalog production as examples where virtual products can be placed in customers’ homes and where 3D allows rapid experimentation with camera angles and lighting. He identifies the “golden eggs” of the pipeline: seamless CAD‑to‑geometry conversion, high‑quality scanning (photogrammetry) for non‑CAD items, and efficient model conversion for AR/VR/MR use cases, noting current technical limitations. Development is split between in‑house teams and external partners such as Swedish firms (e.g., Catapoly/ScanTapoly) and global collaborators like Nike, Adidas, Pixar, Volvo, and LEGO. Frith warns that rapid digital transformation can cause companies to lose sight of brand identity and to mis‑allocate talent, emphasizing the need for specialists who understand both the creative and technical domains. IKEA’s culture—values of togetherness, open‑door leadership, and internal mobility—supports extensive training, exemplified by photographers becoming 3D artists. Change management is driven by hands‑on mentorship, trust in experts, and encouraging employees to lead projects. Looking ahead, Frith discusses experiments with mixed reality, the anticipated shift from smartphones to wearables, and a move toward real‑time, interactive assets rather than static images. He stresses that technology is still catching up, but the industry will see a gradual transition to real‑time rendering within the next three to five years. The conversation concludes with reflections on cross‑industry collaboration and the importance of an end‑to‑end 3D workflow for apparel and retail.
Chapters
Tron the movie is what spurred me— not the remake, the original— yeah, it's what made me want to do 3D, actually. And I was at school at the time, and I asked school to support me on how I can do that kind of thing. And at that time, it was like Walt Disney, and no one really did it as like an industry like today. So I was put into engineering. Yeah, so I did engineering, and then I worked into military flight simulation, and I did that for a while, and I went to games, and I've worked in— but 3D has always been my thing. I've always just liked— I really like the technology and the development of technology, but I love the communication part of it and how it meets people, and I love that.
Amazing.
So there you go.
Yeah, that's really cool. Tron, obviously quite a while ago, um, and 3D, especially in the fashion industry in this context, has made huge changes in the last few years. I imagine over the last 30 years or whatever that is, you know, you've seen these changes in animation as well?
Yeah, yeah, I did a presentation at IKEA fairly recently about the history of 3D, like, originally started, like, you know, 1960s, you know, vector graphics and stuff like that, and then how it moved on. And it's incredible to see how much it's changed. I think if you watch Toy Story— of course you've watched, everyone's watched Toy Story— I've watched Toy Story 1 and you watch Toy Story 3, the difference But I think actually that's an important thing, is technology has now got so good that you now need to find smarter ways of using 3D rather than it just making stuff look more real. And this is what I was kind of emphasizing today. It's not about making a digital replica, you've got to make it look beyond a digital replica, but using the tools and technology to maybe do something you couldn't normally do. Like, that's why I mentioned about the New York apartment skyline thing. The way you would have had to have done it before is like, even with a 360 Cameras, go there, shoot it, wait for the right lighting conditions. What if it thunderstorms? You might only have 2 days booked or whatever, but in 3D you can just do what you want. It gives the impossible possible.
Yeah.
So that's something I love about it as well.
When you apply that to an IKEA context, I mean, what are IKEA making impossible possible?
I think maybe like if you take IKEA Place, For example, we're taking the product, a digital product, into someone's home, but they don't physically have it there. I mean, that for us in our world is, well, that's just normal, but that is actually creating something that's impossible to do, right? I can select from hundreds and thousands of different types of product and see how they work in a different space with lighting and everything. So it's really, that's an example. Um, and I think what we've been trying to do, especially with our images and the brochures and the catalogs, I've been trying to make them look a little less 3D'd, doing other stuff like different camera angles, different kind of expressions and ways in which to make things feel— while it's kind of— can be quite hard to do that in photography. You need a lot of experimentation in photography, while in 3D you can actually just tweaking numbers and tweaking technical things that will actually make it a lot easier. So you can actually experiment a lot more in 3D.
Yeah. Do you really enjoy that side of it, the sort of full creative license?
I used to. I don't do that anymore myself, if that's what you mean, but if you mean IKEA, absolutely. I mean, yeah, it's one of the things that people are most passionate about actually, is developing and taking the technology forward and advancing it. We think we're kind of not behind, but we think we've still got so much to do. But whenever we meet people, they always, oh my God, you're doing so much ahead of everyone else. We have a lot of great collaborations, a lot of great partners, because we're not really a competitor to, like, say, Nike, or, you know, a competitor to Pixar, right? But they love to learn from us, and we'd love to learn from them. So we love all that kind of stuff.
Yeah, that's amazing, because really it's a boundaryless world that you've got at your hands. And sometimes in that situation, it's hard to know what to focus on first. Because there's so many options.
Yeah, yeah, I mean, of course there's a business angle to it as well. You focus on things that's the main bread and butter, should we say, catalogue, digitalisation of the catalogue, you know, brochures, the way we communicate with the customer, how we sell a product to a customer. But yeah, you're right, there isn't really a boundary as such. It's quite innovative. You can kind of really, hey, should we, uh, how do we put Like something I didn't actually talk about today, and you can maybe mention, we talk about the future of 3D, um, about mixed reality. Um, the technology is not there yet, and we find this quite a few times. We have ideas and innovations we want to do, but the technology isn't there. Like the lady asked earlier in the presentation about content management systems, it's like, yeah, but we have to develop a much bigger way of transferring data. So often the technology hinders us from doing what we want. And that's pretty exciting.
Yeah, yeah.
It means we have— we are doing something that's kind of quite far advanced. So yeah.
So what needs to happen for that actually to work then? Which technology is the sort of weakest component with this? Because you're always only as strong as your weakest component.
Yes, very good. I think I touched on it in there. One of the— because only 50%, 55, 50% of our range is CAD and 50%, 45% is non-CAD. Right, so I'd say everyone laughs, I call them like golden eggs, okay? Because if you can do the golden eggs, they're like the magical pieces of the puzzle that will make everything so much better, right? One of those is getting CAD data straight into geometry with the materials and all the data associated with it. We've pretty much got that now, which is great. Um, but then, um, doing it from soft product. The other 50% into poly is something that's— we're developing a lot, but it really needs a lot more work. Um, you saw the scanning technology, the photogrammetry work. It's great for things that are from a distance, great things like a plant or whatever that you're not going to get close to, but it's not good enough to meet our demands, and technology holds it back. The other one is converting, because of course it's also a lot often about cost and efficiency and quality, right? So what conversions can we do to take those models and put them into virtual reality, augmented reality, mixed reality, planning solutions, blah blah blah, right? Um, sometimes we have to develop those particular components, but some of them we have to do by hand, right? So the conversion is one of the other golden eggs. So Catapoly, ScanTapoly, yeah, right? And then conversion, what I classify as more than 3 golden eggs. Okay, but those technologies need a lot of development, a lot of development.
Do you do that in-house, that development, or do you work with partners, as you were saying?
Yeah, yeah, I mean, we do some in-house, some partners, but it's usually a collaborative thing. Yeah, um, we work with a lot of really great Swedish companies and, you know, other companies from different around the world who, like, for example, the Skantepoly— I went to the name— we like Skantepoly, uh, the Catapoli company co-developed with us for like over a year and a half of getting it just right, and they continue to develop it as well, and it's quite bespoke, it's quite unique, so that's great. So we do some in-house and some out.
Okay, cool. We're talking a lot about digital transformation, I mean it's like the word innovation, it's a little bit overused, you know, we're hearing it every single day.
Yes.
But it is real and, you know, we understand what it really means. It is pressuring organizations to change quite rapidly, or at least that pressure is is keenly felt. What do you think are the common mistakes being made in this sort of rapid change?
I mean, I can only give you my opinion, not IKEA's opinion, but my opinion is that a lot of companies embrace technology and lose track of who they are, right? And I think that's something everyone has to be aware of because everyone just thinks digital transformation, let's just work out how we do technology, technology, technology, but they kind of lose sense of what their brand is about. That makes sense.
Yeah.
And I think that's, that's a really key thing for me. That's something I'm going through within the organization. It's like, how do we not lose sense of our home furnishing and our brand and our identity just because we're innovating and developing? I think that can be a mistake. Um, I think having the right people in the right place is a big one as well, because it's not just about developing. Like, I worked in games for a long time, and you can put— you always have to have specialists in games. You have artists, programmers, producers, different people, but they're always experienced in that field. But to put people who've never worked in that field doing that, it's just crazy. So you've never happened in a lot of industries. And I think a lot of big retailers, you know, can just put someone who's done IT running 3D, or someone who's done kind of banking running, you know, the development, right? Because it's done from a business perspective rather than a technology perspective, if that makes sense.
Yeah, yeah.
So that's another thing that people can fail on, I think.
Um, so yeah, yeah, company culture, don't lose that. Yeah, and make sure you've got the right people.
Yeah, the right people, right place. Yeah, that was a much quicker and easier way of putting it.
I know, I mean, it doesn't work as well for a half an hour podcast. No, you can just shorten everything to 10-second answers.
No, exactly, right people, right place. Yeah, I think you're right. I mean, I'm very, very, very lucky in IKEA that, um, 3D is now such a hot topic, as we like to call it, in the organization. But it's not being shunned or pushed away, it's being embraced, which is really good. Um, the challenge is, of course, if you take retail, they can't wait for the right things to be set up necessary, and then they need to develop and develop and develop and put stuff to the customer. and I think that's a little bit of a risk of not being aligned with the rest of the organization. But then it also happens across the whole organization because it's such a hot topic and it's such an important thing that everyone's trying to do it. So part of what I'm trying to do is keep it all together.
Were you there at the beginning of the 3D journey for IKEA?
No, no, I've only been in the organization for 2 and a half years. Okay, never worked there before. Oh wow, no.
Well, I've got a couple of questions. I mean, I want to start first of all on company culture. It seems like it's something that you value at IKEA.
Yeah, absolutely. It's probably everything, um, values. IKEA have key values: togetherness, lead by example, etc. And a lot of it's about people, um, and it's such a key integral part of us. I say you can only ever work there if you actually have those values as part of you. That makes sense. I have my own key values as a human being, but they're quite connected in some ways to the IKEA values. So yeah, culture is really, really important. Yeah, it's not just about numbers and figures, it's about the people, it's about how we develop people. It's one of the reasons why it's such a great— another reason why it's such a great organization is because they encourage you, if you, if you don't have passion in something, to maybe explore other options within the organization. You'll find a lot of people have been there for a long time have moved from one thing to another to another to another to another because they can have that opportunity, because it's about them as a person and it's about developing them as a person rather than 'No, you're only over here for 10 years because that's where you're best.' Yeah, you know, so it's a great company.
I guess you need a lot of training then in different areas as well, and they're willing to give that training to people who want to learn a new skill.
Yeah, they're very into people development, very into training, very into learning, very into coaching.
With that comes a change management aspect, and, um, that's certainly something that we talk a lot about in the apparel and footwear fashion spaces. Yeah, with the introduction of new technology. Comes big change. How does IKEA manage that change?
Um, well, if I can touch on competence development or training first, um, I'll give you an example. We've had photographers who wants to be 3D artists, and we've trained them through tools, techniques, training programs, sitting, shadowing, others to learn how to do that. But then that's also a really nice way of cross-fertilising those two competencies, because that's bringing a photographer into more technology, and, you know, someone's very technical into more of like a physical-based production. And I think that's quite an exciting thing. But also I think with confidence development, it's about finding what fires people, you know, fires them up. I don't mean firing them that way, but I mean inspires them, let's say that. And then you can embrace that and watch people grow. And I think there's nothing more satisfying than watch people grow and blossom. And that's really, really actively encouraged in the organization. So if someone enjoys 3D, like we got a lot of passion about 3D, a lot of excitement within the whole organization around 3D. But a good thing as well, it's not also, doesn't come from anybody who doesn't understand the topic, if that makes sense. So they trust— they put a lot of trust in people like me and Martin and a lot of people who know the stuff, we've been in it for a long time, and then we can take it forward. They don't try and do it themselves, if that makes sense. Yeah, so that's good as well. So they realize if they're not— it's okay to not take everything as leading, it's okay to fail. So it's actually what you're encouraged as a leader in IKEA to do is to have others take the lead and encourage them to take the lead. Okay, right. So what you kind of do as a leader and a manager is you have people around you who are super skilled, super competent, and you use them to do the work. I use— you know what I mean? That you're enabling them to grow and develop. And if there's a lot of trust in there, and you watch people grow when they're in that environment, it's incredible. Watch like project leaders like, no, look, you make the right decision, you're the one who knows this, you go, you— I trust in you. And then they really blossom in that environment rather than waiting for authority and clarification on everything.
Okay.
That's really important. Like, you can approach any managing director, it's not a problem. It doesn't— you can approach anybody in the organization. It's not a hierarchical structure as such. Yeah, it's very, very— and it's very open working environment, very open doors. So yeah, good.
Um, do you know when they first turned to 3D? I mean, I know you said you weren't there at the beginning, But do you know what drove that decision and when that happened?
Yeah. 2006 was the first time they started working in 3D properly, producing assets in 3D. That was when it got the first thumbs up and the go-ahead. Very, very, very small team then. It was kind of like a little pet project. I think one of our ranges, Bastille, is a big storage solution, and to do every single one of those items by hand or photograph those— if you imagine if I build a Bastore solution, I have to replace the doors all the time. It's a lot of work. That's why I said earlier about thousands of combinations, right? Because you could have a shelf here, shelf there, you could have a different door front, and then you've got to do it all again for different combinations if you photograph it. So 3D was really encouraged to to support that.
Okay.
So they looked at building one model and replicating and swapping stuff in and out, and that's probably one of the key things that started 3D going. And then they realized they could do a lot more with it.
So yeah, I guess that then informs the design eventually.
Yeah, yeah, exactly.
You realize, oh my God, we've got all these options, and suddenly your whole design team— so were they then using 3D to design products? As well as just to visualize products that they had already been designed.
Yeah, that makes perfect sense. Um, in 2006, I don't think so. I'm not entirely sure, but I don't think so. Um, I think the visualization and 3D in product design came a little bit later. Um, I mean, CAD's been around for a long time. You could say CAD is 3D, AutoCAD or whatever. It's probably being used for engineering then, but not in the extent it is now. They're working in SolidWorks and CAD engineering tools, and it's like now such a key part. And of course, the great thing about that is you can go from an engineering file straight into something else and cross-fertilize when it comes to 3D, rather than it being something bespoke in each section.
What do you think apparel companies can learn from IKEA?
That's a big statement. Um, no, That's a very big statement.
Well, you were saying earlier that you work with Nike and you've had partnerships with— so you already have partnerships with apparel companies?
Yeah, absolutely. I mean, it's not necessarily a partnership, partnership like a business partnership. It's more like a collaboration. Um, yeah, I mean, as an example, and also I should mention Adidas as well, we have a lot of these really good collaborations because it's what they want to learn from us I guess, is more to do with the tools and the techniques. Some, like for example, Pixar wants to talk to us about how we do our content management system. This is Pixar, right? Yeah. Right? But then they're developing USD, which is a uniform, universal scene descriptor, right, of how they combine stuff so you can build scenes just from a tiny file. And we're now getting that from them. So, this is a really good way of, like, working cross-borders. We work really closely with Volvo and LEGO. You know, and you watch LEGO do a lot in 3D and they developed and they're kind of, their momentum, oh God, I hope they don't mind me saying this, their momentum slowed a little bit and we met them a couple of weeks ago and talked about how we can support them building that momentum again.
Yeah.
You know, so that's not Aperol. No, that's all right.
I mean, it does raise a good point because collaboration between companies, whether you're in the same industry or outside the same industry, is really, really important and we see that a lot. A lot at these events. Yeah, I'm always amazed by how many companies want to come and meet and talk to each other and work together to move the industry forward. Yeah, exactly.
Yeah, but it's exactly it. And I think that's something you're really, really smart you're adding there, because for us, I mean, okay, it's IKEA, so people maybe see it as a dollar sign, right? But actually we're much more interested in doing that kind of open, free collaboration between, you know, we can give and then we get something back. And it's about developing the future of everything and just moving things forward. Yeah, I mean, for the apparel industry though, I mean, um, but there's so much in there. It's kind of why I try to do the whole end-to-end thing today, which say that from just an idea to meeting the consumer, a lot of people get stuck in certain stages. A lot of people will just get stuck in, well, we've done our design, oh, we should probably put it in 3D, and they're separating it. And what we're trying to do is create one flow from an idea to meeting the customer, all with 3D. And it's, I mean, of course there's other ways of doing that, of course, but I think a lot of people get stuck in the technology. That's what I was trying to say earlier, because they can go, oh, we've got something and then we should kind of put— doesn't everyone put it in 3D? Yeah, we'll do it in 3D. But they don't think about the total customer journey, and I think that's something that maybe people should think about, is how do they create that end-to-end journey.
Yeah. Excellent, excellent. Well, I guess looking to the future, what can you tell me? Wish I could. I know. In terms of your future within 3D at IKEA, is there anything really exciting that you can tell me about?
My future or IKEA's journey?
Well, I guess IKEA's journey.
Yeah, I'm trying to think what I can talk about. We've been doing a lot of experimentation with mixed reality. We can see a real gain there. If you can— I think, again, this is a personal opinion, it's not necessarily true, but the way I think we see technology and the industry going, that people won't have mobile phones anymore in a few years' time. It'll be wearable. And you need to kind of start preparing for that kind of environment. So we've been looking into like mixed reality and how we can have a customer walking around the store and then seeing information and data and stock availability and what works with it and what home furnishing solutions work with it in that. But the technology is letting us down. Technology is not ready. We know what we need to do, we know we could develop it and do it, but the technology is not quite there yet. So that's something we've been exploring more. We're kind of waiting for the tech. We're working with some great people. I won't You probably know all the big players when it comes to mixed reality, but they've been really helpful, really supportive, but they also see it as being an evolving technology. I think that's a big thing. But it's also maybe just something else as well is that I don't think— did I have it in there? Oh no, I've got it in the workshop this afternoon. I've got a graph which is really just a very simple graph of where images are today and where real-time will be. And I think you'll see the industry when it comes to communication going much more in real time. So I think you'll see images like rendered images just being gradually faded out.
Okay.
And I think you'll see much more being done in real time in the next few years, like sort of 3-5 years. I mean, most of our customers will, I think, will probably interact with like real time on the web, looking at products, zooming in, zooming out, interacting and opening and closing product on the website. And through an app, through a mobile phone, for a device. And I think that that's not images anymore, that's now real-time assets.
Yeah.
But I think as the technology gets better and people's machines and mobile phones get more smarter, or even wearables get really technical, that the quality will go really high. And we're seeing that quality keeps moving.
Yeah.
And that's another challenge, I guess, for any apparel company or anybody who's doing this, is keeping with the trends and keeping with the industry, because because it is evolving so fast. Yeah. It is rapidly moving.
Yeah.
And you've got to kind of work with it, because you're never going to— I don't think anyone would be able to always be at the front of it, because something else— I mean, like some of the conversations we've had with different companies and what they're suddenly exploring is so far ahead, but they're behind on others. So I don't think anyone is actually fully ahead of everything. Yeah. There you go.
Amazing. Daniel.
Oh, thank you. Thanks very much.
