fashion is embracing the metaverse.
The Metaverse and Fashion. For some, it might sound like an unexpected combo. But the industry as a whole is embracing tech, digital and gaming. And it’s interesting to see which brands are trying and winning.
Just after the “real-life” fashion month, Decantraland will now host a digital fashion week, including virtual shows, stores and events over the course of four days. Decantraland is also opening this event up for everyone. There is literally no need to buy tickets.
So this could be the first time for many of us to enjoy front row seating when Gucci, for example, showcases their new collection.
We can expect virtual avatars walking the runways, showcasing digital clothing that will be shoppable and wearable for your own digital persona. Meaning, people will be able to wear the items in Decantraland. For example, if you're visiting and watching a fashion show during MVFW, you can buy a digital piece of clothing that you like via an NFT and wear it instantly on your avatar. It’s also rumoured that some digital items will have a physical twin. So you’ll win in both worlds.
The event has definitely stressed the fact that they want to serve as an official virtual fashion week destination, compared to some one-off virtual experiences that popped up as an alternative to a real-life event over the past C19 years.
One thing is for sure, digital fashion and virtual experiences are going from very niche to mainstream nowadays. A lot of brands and their audiences take it really seriously. And they should. A couple of months ago, our clients mostly asked the question “what is the metaverse?”. Today, they’re realising it’s an essential part of luxury/fashion brand strategy. There are a couple of brands really embracing technology and the examples below speak for themselves.
1. GUCCI
Italian powerhouse Gucci has been all over the metaverse lately. The luxury fashion brand hosted a “Gucci Garden” on Roblox, in which players were able to buy digital-only clothes, items and accessories, such as sunglasses, clothes, bags, etc. Interestingly enough, a lot of these items were sold for more than their physical twin.
2. LOUIS VUITTON
Louis, the game, is a mobile app that follows “Vivienne” through six different worlds where she needs to collect 200 candles for the birthday of Louis Vuitton. The brand is celebrating 200 years of conquering the fashion world, so that’s the foundation of the game concept.
But this game isn’t like any other virtual fashion experience. It’s actually pretty complex, has a lot of layers and maybe more importantly, it’s quite addictive. I was expecting a short, nice and easy experience of a couple of minutes. But they actually built an entire virtual world, combined with great storytelling.
Throughout the game, there are also 30 NFTs that you can find, all of them designed by Beeple. Of course, each and every one of them is a collectable and it can only be found through playing the game. This game is a great idea for LV to tap into its younger audience.
Our beloved Gen-Z customers are pretty hard to impress these days, so creating this challenging and addictive game is definitely a great idea to try and do just that. Essentially, it’s a great opportunity for the fashion house to introduce themselves to yet another new group of customers.
3. NIKE
NIKELAND on Roblox. It’s here to stay. They really settled down in the virtual world and it’s been highly successful for the last couple of months. It includes Nike buildings, fields and arenas for players to compete in a whole lot of mini-games such as Dodgeball or “The floor is lava”.
Tapping into that experience, they have now announced that LA Lakers superstar, LeBron James will visit NIKELAND and contribute to its basketball features and mini-games.
The King himself will coach players and teach them the fundamentals of basketball through a series of interactive mini-games. Additionally, the NIKELAND showroom will also be the first official platform to launch virtual versions of LeBron’s Nike 19 shoes. Pretty crazy, right? Sneakerheads across the world will definitely want to be part of that.
So, it’s safe to say that the fashion industry is really embracing the metaverse. They aren’t just exploring or discovering anymore, but really creating and designing amazing virtual experiences for their audiences to discover. While the physical aspect of fashion is not going anywhere, the digital twin taps just into another way for their customers to express themselves in the virtual realm.
