Canadian shopping centre owner Cadillac Fairview is launching a unique and innovative holoportation technology, PORTL, at CF Toronto Eaton Centre, which will bring fashion shows to life during this holiday season.
PORTL beams people and places in life-sized, volumetric 4K in real time. CF will showcase this futuristic technology to beam holograms of models for its Shop the Look holiday fashion show at the CF Toronto Eaton Centre and throughout the holiday shopping season via three locations throughout the property.
“With PORTL, CF is investing once again in experiences that drive innovation in the Canadian retail space,” said Andrea Nickel, Director of Customer Experience and Marketing Communications, Cadillac Fairview. “Our customers’ expectations are continuously evolving, which is why we’re always looking for creative solutions to offer our guests the most efficient and inspiring shopping experiences.
“Thanks to the team at PORTL, shoppers will be able to immerse themselves in the latest trends this holiday season with a fun, holographic fashion show and then know where to find those looks at CF Toronto Eaton Centre with an easily accessible digital shopping guide.”
Cadillac Fairview said that for the first time in Canada the groundbreaking PORTL holoportation technology will be on full display at the CF Toronto Eaton Centre for a fashion show unlike any other and a worldwide first, beamed exclusively to visitors at the country’s most iconic shopping centre.
QR codes will be posted at each PORTL holographic display and will direct shoppers to CF’s Shop the Look Holiday Hub, a website that provides details on all the looks from the show and directs visitors to retail locations at CF properties where they can purchase the items.
“PORTL is all about bringing people together, and we’re proud to be doing it in Canada,” said David Nussbaum, CEO and Inventor of PORTL Inc. “Thanks to our partnership with Cadillac Fairview, we’ll be demonstrating to Canadians how our hologram technology is changing shopping, business, education, entertainment and the world. When we beam the fashion models into CF Toronto Eaton Centre this week, shoppers will be witnessing the future – a new kind of sustainable transportation that lets people have meaningful interactions across every kind of divide. Like we say, ‘If you can’t Be there, Beam there.’”
Nickel said as Cadillac Fairview looked to build out its holiday program it wanted Canadians to rediscover the magic of the holiday season.
“We’re constantly looking to improve and innovate and we know that Canadians more than ever are very eager to get out to enjoy the holidays in a fun and safe way,” she said. “We also wanted to connect their visit with shopping in a very inspiring experience as well.
“As we thought about the Shop The Look program which incorporates the PORTL we thought what better way to bring to life the magic of the season and the hottest trends of the season within almost a real life fashion show. It’s the first holographic fashion show in Canada which is pretty cool to be able to partner with PORTL.”
This is the first time that PORTL has been used in Canada, and the first time the company’s holoportation technology has been used to beam fashion models live into a world-class retail property to interact with the public.
“The PORTL device itself, it really helps to bring that fashion, bring those hottest trends to life, because it is a holoportation device . . . It really does look almost real life,” said Nickel.
She said the device will be in three different locations at the Eaton Centre – one court space beside Nordstrom and two other locations where two empty storefronts have been taken.
“It will continue through the month of December and all the way to early January and we have fresh content being released every single week. So essentially almost like a new fashion show will be released every week with different looks and tied to the trends of the season,” added Nickel.
Cadillac Fairview sees potential in the future for the use of this technology in other ways and in other centres.
“This is absolutely a test that we’re running in partnership with PORTL but I could absolutely see a future for it depending on how well this goes. As we look to the future and every season has new hottest trends and looks and as we look to support our retailers and connect the experiences that shoppers are having within our properties to drive them into our retailers to shop, we definitely see a direct connection to what we’re delivery in terms of that experience to inspire our shoppers to go over and buy with our retailers and help their sales and revenue overall,” said Nickel.
PORTL Inc. is the maker of hologram devices and the software and cloud services to support holoportation. Founded in 2018 by inventor and CEO David Nussbaum, its award-winning products are now in use all over the world, beaming executives, tech and science experts, and sports and music celebrities to events, displaying NFTs and other objects, and becoming a vital new tool for education, retail, marketing, and the hospitality industry.
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Additional Photos from CF Toronto Eaton Centre / PORTL
