Building a chatbot for Fondation Cartier

BASE Design’s chatbot for the Cartier Foundation of Contemporary art in Paris offers a new way to explore the museum’s collection. But building a bilingual bot is no easy feat. We asked BASE Managing Director Jacques Letesson about how it was created and why the museum was keen to venture into the world of AI…

We are now firmly in the era of the chatbot. Retailers from H&M to Lidl have used bots to market new collections and choose from a wide range of products (in Lidl’s case, its wine range). Channel 4 launched a witty bot to promote AI drama Humans and beauty brands from Sephora to Smashbox have built bots to help customers find makeup to suit their complexion. Taco Bell has even set up a bot that allows customers to order tacos through Slack.

The Cartier Foundation for Contemporary Art (or Fondation Cartier as it is known in France) is the latest cultural institution to design a chatbot, created using Google’s Dialogflow technology.