September 25, 2009

The future of fashion is virtual.

As Fashion Week evolves from industry event to public phenomenon, designers have been contemplating how to keep their shows exclusive while making all of their customers feel included. Fashion's Night Out, while not a financial success, was a big step toward the democratization of Fashion Week, letting the public meet (or at least gape at) influential designers and buy in by, well, buying in.

Twitter-happy designer Alexander McQueen has another idea. His shows have always been as much performance art as fashion showcase, featuring real flames, live insects, giant chess sets, heaps of rubbish, and a hologram of Kate Moss among their wonders over the years. With video of previous shows already available on his website, he's involving the public in real time this season by broadcasting the SS10 catwalk live over the internet. And he's not the only one: Burberry, Sienna Miller's Twenty8Twelve, Michael Kors, and Isaac Mizrahi already did the same this spring; while some designers on a budget, like Shipley & Halmos, flipped the equation (above) by presenting their designs via video at their Fashion Week shows.

Photo via Racked
 
Creative Commons License
MBF Trend Talk by MBF Trend Consulting is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-No Derivative Works 3.0 United States License.
Based on a work at mbf-trendtalk.blogspot.com.