Metaverse Fashion Week 2023: still lonely but maturing
Web3 fashion is developing fast, but its metaverse part is by far the weakest.
This year’s Metaverse Fashion week is taking place from March 28 to 31 across three platforms: Decentraland, Spatial, and Over (AR).
The mood, however, is somewhat different from the last year: less hype and excitement, more design-focused attitude.
👜 Dolce & Gabbana is still the only luxury brand to participate, this time by launching a competition among young fashion designers.
Gucci, Balenciaga, Prada, and other renowned Houses with an active web3 agenda stay clear of the metaverse for the moment, and this is understandable: Decentraland graphics is still primitive and cannot represent their product in the best way. Nor the little metaverse exposure was worthwhile.
👟 Among the middle-range brands, there were DKNY, COACH, Dundas, Boss, while Tommy Hilfiger, Adidas and Mango represented mass fashion.
Etro and Philip Plein, which participated in the last year’s edition, have jumped ship, while the cool New Yorker brand House of Barth has made its metaverse debut.
👘 Digital fashion brands DressX and The Fabricant had a capturing presence, of course, and newcomers like Polycount allowed emerging designers to showcase their creations. Some non-fashion companies, like Kraken exchange, have also decided to exhibit their digital art.
👗 It may be still too early for a virtual reality catwalk, but this does not mean that other fashion-related projects are without interest.
This year’s exposition of Cristóbal Balenciaga’s iconic couture creations transformed into NFTs (not related to the brand Balenciaga) was a nice touch of fashion culture that everyone could get a piece of.
The event will also host panels and masterclasses of the web3 and AI fashion
👯 Overall, it is still quite lonely in Decentraland, but as more digital designers choose it to express themselves, the space can get more gravity and become a major exposition center for digital creations.
This will need time though.
