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Fashion Friday: Virtual Runways Trend Setting
- Author: Vivianne Lapointe
- Posted on: Thursday October 8, 2009 at 7:00 PM
- Filed under: exclusive, fashion, alexander mcqueen, live stream
"One day we're gonna live in Paris · I promise · I'm on it", dreamed the Friendly Fires in their infectious, dance-punk hit Paris. Bless our Manolo Blahnicks/Louboutins/Fill-in-expensive-yet-adorable-shoe-here, that day may not be so far away.
Maybe it is budget-cuts, maybe the fashionistas are just wisening up, but more and more cutting-edge labels seem to be espousing live stream technology for fashion shows these days. In London Fashion week October 2-9th, Burberry and Sienna Miller's label Twenty8Twelve streamed live. In NY Sept 10-17th, Michael Kors was first to rev up on the trend.
Earlier this week in Paris, Alexander McQueen presented a daring, sea-creatures inspired Spring/Summer 2010 collection, titled Plato's Atlantis, simultaneously online via live stream in partnership with SHOWstudio. (Sure, the show was slightly delayed due to a tech glitch, but some things are worth waiting for, aren't they?)
The novelty of the technology?
...Wet models, and robots on the runway?
... Or the return of terrifying, aardvark-like, sky-high platform heels!?
Watch the show again on SHOWstudio (it's sick!)... and stay updated with McQueenWorld on Twitter.
Even more daring, on October 7th, Louis Vuitton inked out a deal with Facebook - enabling a live online broadcast of its Women’s Spring/Summer 2010 Ready to Wear collection exclusively on Facebook on October 7, 2009 at 2:30PM (Paris time) / 8:30AM EST to their facebook fans. Oh la la cutting edge, LV is officially the first luxury brand to offer a live broadcast of its Women’s Spring/Summer 2010 Ready to Wear show exclusively on Facebook. The draw-back? Only fans of the page (approximately 49,876 people) were able to exclusively stream the show on the fan page and only for 24 hours.
Meanwhile Dolce & Gabbana, the Italian brand, conducted a live stream that mixed backstage footage (even better) with catwalk views. The result? Its You Tube Channel project, ‘The Pre-Show Diaries’, generated 16 million contacts. (Said the designers, “We are very happy, considering that prior to this the fashion show was viewable only by about 1,000 selected guests” according to Telegraph UK.)
In always-ahead-of-the-times-Tokyo? Uniqlo's Tokyo Collection website boasts yet another avant-garde virtual runway experience.
The point? On one fine day not so long away, anyone and everyone can simply jump into the rabbit hole of technology to watch a front row perspective of all the world's Fashion Weeks - without even having to scuff their manalos.
Images via Coutorture's Twitter
