The Founding Philosophy
MEMORIAE MUNDI was founded by Jean-François Nebel and Nicolas Druz,
who holds this truth with quiet conviction:
,,
« A brand’s heritage is not a decorative narrative—it is a threefold endowment: a strategic asset for the enterprise, a cultural treasure for the nation, and an emotional journey for the individual. It is capital, archive, and affect—all encoded in symbolic form.
Heritage Brands possess a rare faculty: to articulate stories that do more than recall—they orient. They weave continuity across rupture, rendering the past legible, the present meaningful, and the future imaginable. Their true purpose is not preservation alone, but projection—toward what might yet be.
For when Brand Heritage is activated—not fossilized—it becomes a force of regeneration.
Heritage Brands, governed with symbolic discipline and ethical clarity, can inspire innovation that does not sever, promote sustainability that is not opportunistic, and model inclusion that is grounded in continuity rather than performance.
In an age of volatility and noise, they offer a rare kind of silence—an anchoring presence. They do not chase time; they inhabit it. By preserving the essential and embracing the emergent, they model a deeper temporality: one that honors the slowness of meaning while navigating the speed of change.
And beyond commerce, they educate. Heritage brands are transmitters of knowledge, custodians of gesture, syntax, and story. They carry forward the invisible grammars of craft, place, and value. They teach not only where we come from, but how to walk with coherence toward the future.
In this sense, their legacy is not a static monument—it is a living system. A brand of true heritage is not simply remembered. It remembers. It re-members—binding past and present into a coherent whole, alive with purpose and meaning. »
Jean-François Nebel
Nicolas Druz
Jean-François Nebel
Founding and Managing Partner
Jean-François Nebel brings more than three decades of international experience at the intersection of global business, academic research, and cultural heritage. Before embarking on his entrepreneurial journey, he spent fifteen years in senior positions at Unilever, L’Oréal, Accenture, and Kering, where he shaped new frontiers in the revitalization and transmission of brands and businesses with cultural resonance.
​
In 2002, he founded his own Heritage Ventures Endowment dedicated to brands and enterprises rooted in cultural legacy. Over the years, he has guided numerous companies, cultivating a rare blend of strategic foresight, operational expertise, and sensitivity to the symbolic value of time and tradition.
​
His professional path has always been interwoven with a deep commitment to academic inquiry. In 2003, he co-founded the Customer Science Institute (CSI) with Professor Robert Blattberg of Carnegie Mellon University—an international think tank advancing research in customer behavior, customer relationship management, and behavioral modeling.
​
Alongside his corporate and academic work, he has authored several historiographical books and articles, exploring how culture and memory crystallize into enduring forms.
Nicolas Druz
Founding Partner
Nicolas Druz is an international executive and strategic advisor with a singular trajectory across luxury, media, culture, and innovation. With over four decades of senior leadership and advisory experience, he has cultivated a rare expertise in governance, transmission, and transformation.
​
He notably served as CEO of Lanvin, where he was entrusted with guiding one of France’s most emblematic couture houses through a pivotal transition, and later as Managing Director of Fosun Fashion Group, reinforcing his capacity to navigate global luxury ecosystems. Earlier in his career, he also founded the Economical and Financial Italo-French Institute, creating an institutional bridge between France and Italy — a bridge grounded not only in finance, but also in the shared patrimony and craftsmanship excellence of both nations.
​
Throughout his path, Druz has demonstrated a unique ability to connect seemingly distant worlds — from press and cinema to couture and heritage brands — and to render them strategically coherent through memory, creativity, and symbolic capital. This sensitivity to living heritage, combined with proven strategic acumen, resonates with the mission of Memoriae Mundi: to cultivate, protect, and illuminate the world’s collective memories as a compass for the future.
Our Heritage Consultants
The MEMORIAE MUNDI team combines unique senior consulting expertise with deep academic insight, ensuring that every engagement benefits from both rigorous analysis and practical execution. Together, we transform cultural heritage into strategic value.
​
MEMORIAE MUNDI is a distinguished international collegium of heritage experts — consultants, scholars, and practitioners dedicated to transforming history, memory, and tradition into living assets.
Our team unites rigorous theory with practical mastery to ensure heritage remains both relevant and future-facing.
​
Our collegium spans Europe, the Americas, and Asia, offering a global perspective on heritage and brand strategy. They work seamlessly with our consulting teams to deliver both insight and execution — bringing academic depth and practical expertise directly into client engagements to foster growth that is sustainable, inclusive, and culturally resonant.
​
Beyond advisory work, the collegium forms the backbone of our research and innovation: developing proprietary tools, curating archives of methodologies and data, and producing research that advances the frontiers of heritage brand knowledge.
​
MEMORIAE MUNDI is where cultural memory becomes a compass for growth, continuity, and renewal.