Though trained as a lighting designer, Thierry Dreyfus prefers to keep the spotlight off himself, while producing fashion shows and events for the likes of Comme des Garçons, Junya Watanabe, Salomon, KidSuper, Anrealage, 424, Egonlab, Ruohan, Oscar de la Renta, Songyo, Tamara Ralph and No. 21 this fall 2026 season.

But last Thursday, Dreyfus sat down with WWD to exclusively reveal that he sold a 51 percent stake in his luxury event production group Eyesight to Maison BETC. He was joined for the interview by Mercedes Erra, the “E” in BETC and one of the three founders of the French advertising firm, which Dreyfus lauded as “the most creative agency in the world.”

Financial terms were not disclosed.

Dreyfus, 66, and his three partners — all of whom started as interns at Eyesight — participated in the deal, and all are to remain with the company, which has offices in Paris, Milan and New York. They are Edward Ross, Alexandra Avalone and Marie Meresse.

The Eyesight deal takes place against a backdrop of rapid consolidation among PR agencies, production companies and marketing agencies in Europe — and underscores how fashion shows still reign as a vital communications vehicle.

Dreyfus, who founded Eyesight in 2002, said he’s been approached many times over the years, but spurned all offers. However, he felt an immediate connection with Erra, obsessed like him with helping creatives and brands find their best modes of expression, employing everything from art direction, lighting scenography and new media.

He lauded the integrity of BETC, which has done work for the likes of Air France, Evian, Lacoste and Lego, in addition to a host of marquee fashion and luxury brands. (Maison BETC is the branch dedicated to luxury.)

“We have a very specific and artisanal culture, and the agency is very concerned by meaning,” Erra said in the interview. “In our job of advertising, everyone is talking about AI and data and so on. But at the end, it’s a question of culture, and human intelligence.”

That said, Maison BETC and Eyesight are to combine their expertise in AI to take the fashion show experience, and the documenting of it, to new frontiers.

“We share the same pursuit of perfection and the same need for humanity in the way we create,” Dreyfus commented. “We are trying to communicate emotions with our tools.”

He characterized teaming with Maison BETC as “combining our strengths to imagine experiences that are even more sensitive, more accurate and more ambitious for the brands we support.”

In a press release shared exclusively with WWD on Tuesday, Havas, parent of BETC, tallied that Dreyfus and Eyesight have staged more than 3,000 fashion shows, highlighting its “deeply human and integrated approach, grounded in listening, research, sharing, fluidity, broad craft expertise and creative drive.”

Yannick Bolloré, chairman and chief executive officer of Havas, characterized the acquisition as “fully in line with our ambition to offer brands increasingly more desirable, innovative and premium experiences, in a highly specialized area where we were not previously active.”

Born in Paris and raised in the countryside near Chartres, Dreyfus began his career in 1985 assisting the lighting designer at the Strasbourg Opera.

That same year, fashion designer Patrick Kelly asked Dreyfus to light his first show, which he did with a dramatic backdrop of candles. Dreyfus would go on to work on all the fashion shows of Helmut Lang, of Hedi Slimane during his Dior Homme days, of Off-White by Virgil Abloh, and in 2002, Yves Saint Laurent’s final hourlong couture show-slash-retrospective.

Alongside his production work, Dreyfus also designs domestic lamps and lighting for DCW Éditions.