Today, as Global Head of Storage, Yauheni works across operations, commercial development, and global expansion. For him, fine art storage is not simply about keeping works in a secure facility. It is about connecting physical inventory with digital records, giving clients greater visibility, and combining technology with the human expertise needed to care for high-value artworks.
In this conversation, Yauheni reflects on his route into fine art logistics, what makes Convelio’s storage model different, and why the future of storage depends on reliability, precision, and trust.
Yauheni, can you tell us a bit about your background and what led you into fine art storage and logistics?
My academic foundation was in international trade regulations and economics — fairly technical, but it gave me a solid lens for understanding how things move across borders.
From there I joined an international logistics company, where over four years I worked across customs and trade compliance, general logistics, and account management for big corporations in industries ranging from machinery and fashion to metals and sports equipment.
After that, I did my MBA in Paris. I was looking for something at the intersection of logistics experience and a more dynamic, startup or scale-up technology environment — somewhere I could apply what I’d learned but in a context that felt genuinely new. That’s when I found Convelio.
I’ve since had the chance to explore different roles over the last 5.5 years: Strategic Projects, Chief of Staff, and now Global Head of Storage.
What drew you to Convelio, and what makes storage here different from traditional fine art warehousing?
What drew me was the challenge of disrupting a traditional industry. Fine art logistics has long-standing players who’ve been doing things the same way for decades.
But honestly, it was also the people. I was, and still am, genuinely happy to work alongside the amazing individuals here.
And that spirit is precisely what differentiates Convelio’s storage offering. We set out to solve the historical pain points of this industry: poor inventory visibility, a total disconnect between shipping and storage operations, and billing that clients simply couldn’t understand.
Our approach combines proprietary technology — our IMS, Inventory Management Software, which lets clients manage storage and shipping in one place — with art handling expertise that’s on par with the industry’s most established players.
Technology and human expertise, not one at the expense of the other.
What does your role involve on a day-to-day basis as Global Head of Storage?
My role sits across three pillars.
The first is operations: establishing the right processes, maintaining quality standards, and overseeing the day-to-day running of our existing sites.
The second is commercial: I’m actively involved in sales cycles with clients and responsible for driving the P&L of our global storage activity as a whole.
The third is expansion: Convelio has serious ambitions around growing our physical presence globally, and much of my time goes into preparing and launching new sites, like the New York storage opening soon.
Explore secure fine art storage in Paris, London or New York City. Register your interest.
How do you make sure artworks remain safe and secure while also managing documentation, client access, and digital storage systems?
Every work entering our facilities goes through a defined reception process: physical receipt, immediate reconciliation against the client’s records in our IMS, labelling, condition checking with photographic documentation, verification that the packaging is appropriate for safe storage, and placement in its storage location.
From that point, the digital records and physical inventory move together.
Physical access to the facility, as well as any further handling of the artworks, follows defined procedures that protect both the artwork and the chain of custody, with all movements registered in the system.
What role does technology play in modern storage?
A key role, as in almost any industry today. Technology is at the heart of how we run storage at Convelio and it serves two connected purposes.
For our operations teams, it’s about traceability. Every movement, reception, release is logged in real time, creating a complete and reliable record of where each work is and what’s happened to it. That audit trail is what makes it possible to run multiple sites to a consistent standard.
For clients, it goes further than visibility — it’s about actionability. Through our IMS, clients don’t just see their inventory; they can act on it. Request a reception, trigger a release, and initiate a shipment from the same platform.
In traditional fine art storage, this simply didn’t exist, and that level of opacity was often accepted as normal. It shouldn’t be, and we built our technology to replace it.
Where is human expertise still irreplaceable in storage, even as systems become more automated?
Art handling is one of those disciplines where experience lives in hands and eyes more than in a system or just written procedures.
The way a work is approached, wrapped, packed, moved depends on material, fragility, scale, and dozens of contextual factors. Our art handlers bring that knowledge, and it matters enormously for works of high value or unusual complexity.
Beyond handling, human judgement is irreplaceable in client relationships. Reading a situation — understanding when a client needs reassurance, when an issue requires escalation, when a solution needs to be improvised — requires emotional intelligence that technology supports but cannot replicate.
The best storage operations we’ve seen combine systems with people who really care about the work they do.
Convelio’s storage network now spans London and Paris, with New York expansion planned for September 2026. How do you think about building consistency across different markets while still adapting to local needs?
The core of what we offer — rigorous operational processes, transparent reporting, seamless integration between storage and shipping — must be identical everywhere.
A client who stores with us in Paris, London or NYC should experience the same level of care, the same digital visibility, the same operational approach. That’s non-negotiable. Our IMS and global processes are the connective tissue that makes that consistency possible.
What metrics or signals do you keep a close eye on when assessing whether a storage operation is working well?
There are obviously commercial KPIs like occupancy, revenue per square metre, retention. But operationally, I focus on accuracy and completeness. The most fundamental is inventory accuracy: alignment between what’s physically in the facility and what is in your digital records.
Beyond that: completion rates and timeliness of receptions, releases, and condition checks; incident rates as a lagging indicator of process health; and client service metrics.
What are the biggest operational challenges in scaling storage globally for high-value artworks?
Maintaining standards at a distance is the central challenge. When you’re running one site, you’re close to the detail. As you scale, you have to encode quality into processes and systems rather than rely on individual oversight — and consistency across geographies becomes critical. You can’t afford process discrepancies between locations.
There’s also regulatory complexity, and it comes in two layers. Warehouse regulations (safety standards, fire requirements, building compliance, insurance requirements) vary by country and require real local expertise to navigate.
Then there are the shipping and customs regulations, which add another dimension when works are crossing borders between the UK, France, and the US. Storage doesn’t happen in isolation from transport, so our teams need to be fluent in both.
Lastly, there’s the talent dimension. Finding and retaining people who combine technical art handling skills with the values we look for at Convelio is genuinely hard, and it’s a long-term investment.
Looking ahead to New York, what can you tell us about the key priorities for that next storage hub?
The priorities are consistent with what we’ve built in Paris and London: market-leading technology powered by our IMS, a client experience defined by real-time inventory visibility and fast turnaround times, and billing that’s fully transparent.
On the site itself — the building, storage infrastructure, and equipment all need to meet the highest standards.
As for the location itself or size, I’ll keep a little intrigue there. What I will say is that we want to be very accessible to our New York client base, and the site will be designed to run not just storage, but our transport operations for the region efficiently from the same location.
For the rest, stay tuned.
Rapid Fire Questions
One word to describe Convelio storage: Reliable.
Favourite artist: Ivan Aivazovsky.
Guiding principle: Technology and human expertise, not one at the expense of the other.
What should clients feel when storing with Convelio? That their artworks are in safe hands.
For Yauheni, the future of fine art storage is not only about opening new sites. It is about building the same level of care, visibility, and reliability across every location.
From Paris and London to the upcoming New York hub, his approach is clear: storage should be secure, transparent, and connected to the wider logistics journey. The systems matter, but so do the people behind them — the teams who handle each work, maintain the standards, and make sure clients can trust that their artworks are in safe hands.
Interested in joining our Operations teams? Discover our open roles.