Mao Wenting
This past June has been special for the fashion industry. In addition to remote digital live broadcasting, everyone has finally ushered in a physical fashion show that can be watched offline, marking the gradual return of traditional fashion weeks to normal.
Milan Fashion Week was held in late June, one of the first four major fashion weeks to return to offline since the outbreak of the epidemic, followed by Paris Fashion Week. Many fashion people are elated and cautious in coming to these two international fashion capitals.
Dior 2022 Summer Menswear
The Spring/Summer 2022 fashion show starts in mid-June and runs until the beginning of July.
Of course, Europe is still under the epidemic, including Dior, Hermès, Dolce & Gabbana and Diesel brands can make double bookings, digital launch and offline physical shows crossover.
Diesel2022 Spring/Summer Men's Clothing
From 18 to 22 June, the Milan Fashion Week 2022 menswear launch was the first to return, using a mix of physical and digital activities.
At this Milan Fashion Week, Diesel's new creative director Glenn Martens made his debut and launched the "all-gender" collection. Miuccia Prada and Raf Simons' second menswear collection – their first Spring/Summer collection debut as co-creative directors. Dior's Spring/Summer 2022 collection with American rapper Travis Scott debuted.
Prada2022 Spring/Summer Man Costume
After a year of closure, the brand and designers alike cherish the opportunity to get together, and even Gucci, who once said "fashion week is over", is not completely outside milan men's fashion week.
Gucci has set up a special series to celebrate the brand's 100th anniversary, which will be held in the Gucci flagship store on Via Montenapoleone in Milan from June 18 to 19.
Traditional Fashion Week is outdated?
In the past, through Fashion Week, designers would launch their new season collections 6-8 months in advance, followed by manufacturers making clothes, and fashion media also had plenty of time to spread and ferment new fashion trends.
But the pandemic has accelerated judgment that traditional fashion weeks are outdated.
At a virtual press conference at Gucci's Rome studio in May 2020, the brand's creative director, Alessandro Michele, announced that Gucci would reduce the number of fashion shows from five to two per year.
In his opinion, the existing seasonal rhythms and catwalk formats of Fashion Week are outdated, and he no longer adheres to the rotation rhythm of spring/summer, autumn/winter, early spring and early autumn fashion shows. "I think these are old and nutrient-deficient words, and clothes should live longer than these words give them." Instead, Gucci will show the "No Seasons" series twice a year.
Betty Kathu's "Unique Temperament, The Muse of Inspiration" Saint Laurent Fashion Show opens in Shanghai in June 2021
Around the same time last year, Saint Laurent, another French luxury brand that shares Kering with Gucci, announced that it would no longer participate in any fashion weeks in 2020, but intended to "start another stove" and hold catwalks on its own schedule. On July 14 this year, the Venice show will be the first physical show in Saint Laurent since the pandemic. The menswear collection is expected to be on display at the runway, which will coincide with the upcoming 2021 Biennale of Architecture and Theatre.
In Milan last March, Giorgio Armani was also one of the first to turn to digital presentations during the outbreak.
But then he also quickly announced that he would return to the physical show, "during these months, I realized that fashion can't be completely virtual for a long time," he told Vogue last month, "I believe that physical programming will return, but the fashion industry can still provide digital experiences for global audiences." Armani hosted an offline show in Milan on June 21.
In late June, Bruno Pavlovsky, president and president of Chanel SAS Fashion, told WWD that its new fashion show will be held at the Palais Galliera Fashion Museum, "I hope other brands will follow suit." ”
Why is Fashion Week back offline?
Obviously, after choosing the path of digitalization, more and more people are finding that the traditional way still has its irreplaceable points.
In January, Pascal Morand, executive chairman of the French Haute Couture and Fashion Federation (FHCM), also publicly stated that "digitalization has made fashion week lose its sense of rhythm" and that in terms of contrast, color and depth, the digital dimension is far from the visual resolution of the human eye. ”
Olivier Saillard, an expert on fashion history, points out that there are great limitations in digital exhibitions, "fashion is a soft sculpture worn on the body, and the catwalk is a magical performance." "The sense of experience created by Fashion Week and physical shows still has its strong charm. It's just that it's time for change.
Hermès 2022 Summer Menswear
In the face of a new generation of users growing up under the mobile Internet, facing the operating pressure of their own costs and profits, and facing the requirements of sustainable development, Fashion Week should also iterate on forms and seek new life, and digital development has become one of the common choices of the industry.
Combining men's, fashion and women's ready-to-wear displays since the beginning of the year, FHCM says its Paris fashion online platform has attracted 467,000 visitors and 1.5 million page views. Video content was viewed 354 million times, the vast majority of which were viewed on YouTube, and the media impact value so far this year is $242.9 million.
The seamless combination of online and offline is more prominent in China. The format is no longer limited to live shows and short films.
Gucci's new 2021/2022 series Aria of Aria
On June 22, Gucci hosted a fashion show in Shanghai to showcase its new 2021/2022 collection Aria- Fashion Aria, along with 13 new looks that debuted, with creative directors reinventing them with classic elements to bring a new and diverse design. According to the "Fashion Business Express" monitoring, the fashion show was viewed more than 50 million times a night on Weibo.
Digital fashion shows actually appeared long before the outbreak of the epidemic, which made them quickly popular. How the digital dimension of the future will produce the ability of innovation and creation in the fashion industry from the initial emergency measures and standardized actions to more fashion weeks needs to be practiced.
Editor-in-Charge: Chen Hua
Proofreader: Ding Xiao