In the last couple of years, crypto crashed, NFTs fell off a cliff and metaverse-mania fizzled. We asked those working at the forefront of digital fashion about its future. Photo: Courtesy H&M A few years before the pandemic, the future of fashion began to feel very close.
There was Lil Miquela (rings a bell right?), a CGI influencer created in 2016 as an Instagram account that grew to over a million followers in under two years. In 2018, Scandinavian retailer Carlings released a digital clothing collection in partnership with Virtue Worldwide that sold out in a week. By 2022, Gucci, Balmain and Prada had sold digital or phygital fashion as NFTs, and there was a pretty well-attended Metaverse Fashion Week.
But that same year, crypto crashed. NFTs fell off a cliff. At the moment, it feels like the metaverse has been slightly forgotten and everyone’s worrying about AI taking their jobs.
How has this downswing affected fashion’s pixelated dreams? Is digital fashion still in fashion? And what do brands need to do in order to engage with the space in a genuine manner? We asked those working at the forefront of the digital fashion industry to lay it out. Leanne Elliott-Young, CEO and co-founder of the Institute of Digital Fashion Photo: Leanne Elliot-Young Digital fashion is a great solution when it comes to some of fashion’s sustainability and diversity issues. The beauty of a digital asset is in its endless possibilities — both in the hands of the creative as well as the .
