Ask Questions, Will You Buy A Pair Of Virtual Nike Shoes?

In May, Richard Ma, a technical director in Toronto, spent 9500 dollars on a skirt for his wife, Mary.

This dress is unique in shape, like a cloak, with a silver flashing skirt and delicate color swirling patterns. However, this is not a real skirt.

Fabricant, a virtual fashion company in Amsterdam, has completed the appearance design of the skirt, while the Dapper Labs company, which produces block chain products, has made it into a digital product. Ma bought this virtual skirt at the charity auction of New York block chain Summit on Ethereum, an open source block chain platform. The way the dress is worn is somewhat special. Dapper Labs will take a photo of Mary, and then use augmented reality technology to put a virtual skirt on the Mary in order to share the beauty photos with the social media.

Mary Ma wears a virtual long skirt bought by her husband Richard. Photo source: Dapper Labs

As a senior executive of a block chain security company, Ma is not an ordinary consumer. However, some people are willing to spend 10 thousand dollars on a digital dress, which implies that the new era of virtual fashion is coming.

In some areas of science and technology, users spend money on virtual clothes, just as they do in shopping malls. Many companies are trying to make virtual fashion mainstream.

The future may not be as remote as you think: Instagram and Snapchat, which allow users to change their appearance, are very popular. Brands such as Gucci and Nike also use augmented reality technology to enable shoppers to "try on" shoes and clothing without going out. Beauty companies rely on all kinds of filters to give users the delicate appearance.

The next step in the virtual fashion industry is to convince consumers that digital fashion can also be sought after like physical goods. Virtual fashion allows shoppers to follow the trend without worrying about waste. These products can also win consumers the social currency they dream of, that is, "praise" in social media. In addition, virtual fashion can also break the limits of fashion design because we do not need to produce physical objects.

Consumers may never treat virtual products like real products, but that does not mean that the technology industry will not try.

The inspiration from the game world

Virtual products have been popular in the gaming industry for a long time. Online games such as heroes League and watch pioneer often throw money to buy "skin" and put the latest equipment for their heroes.

The night of the fortress developed by Epic Games is a popular online game with more than 250 million users worldwide. It is reported that the company can earn $300 million a month just selling its skin. In May of this year, Nike also launched two Jordan virtual sports shoes designed specifically for this game.

Like games, social media is another virtual world that provides entertainment for people. Modern people spend more time on social media. According to a study by Global Web Index, Z generation spends about 3 hours per day in social media. In a 2018 report, Nielsen, a market research firm, pointed out that American adults spend half their time in social media every day.

Matthew Hartman, partner of Vc firm Betaworks Ventures, said: "very few platforms are able to make users want to dress up their virtual image like the night of the fortress, but Instagram is also a leader in this field. Matthew has invested in many social media start-ups and is very interested in virtual fashion technology.

There are very few platforms that enable users to decorate their virtual images like the night of the fortress, but Instagram is also a leader in this field.

Genies is a virtual image service provider founded in November 2018. Its chief executive, Akash Niham, said: the influence of virtual image in Z generation is increasing day by day, which brings new opportunities for virtual fashion. As a competitor to Snapchat's Bitmoji, Genies allows users to create their own digital clones based on themselves or celebrities, and let virtual images appear in communication applications and social media.

Users can use all kinds of digital goods called "Wheels" to disguise their virtual image, and Gucci and New Balance brands are paying fees to Genies, so that they can implant corresponding brand products on the platform. Nigam said that people have strong interest in the virtual image of decoration. In the coming months, Genies will add more fashion brand virtual products to its platform and launch the charging service.

Spending money on Gucci digital goods to pretend to be a virtual image is a far cry from spending thousands of dollars on a genuine Gucci skirt. But Nigam believes that digital goods can play a role in developing brand loyalty: "some children can't afford Gucci in real life, but they can get enough addiction in the digital world. This is an entry."

　 Major brands have entered the field of virtual fashion.

Last November, Carlings, a fashion brand from Scandinavia Peninsula, launched 19 sets of virtual costumes priced from 10 to 30 euros. Consumers who buy services need to submit personal photos, and then technicians will create personal 3D images in virtual costumes accordingly.

Vice Media employee Stefanos Constantinou bought several virtual costumes. He said that virtual clothing would not cause waste, so that he could show people on the Instagram every day.

Consumers wear Carlings's virtual series costumes. Picture source: Carlings

Constantinou said, "I have a lot of shoes, and a lot of them only go through one or two times, and then I put them in the corner. The purchase of virtual goods can not only create new models, but also create waste.

Compared with Carlings's physical products sales, these virtual garments are only a drop in the ocean. Carlings has 200 stores in Scandinavia Peninsula, and Carlings products are sold at a high price. But Ronny Mikalsen, chief executive of Carlings, said he was very optimistic about large-scale production of virtual clothing.

He said, "we send large quantities of free samples to well-known bloggers and net red every year. These people often put them aside once they try them on. It's just a waste of thought. Virtual fashion can solve this problem well. "

Steven Vasilev, the founder of the sports shoes brand Free Customs, said that virtual products could also bring convenience to sports activities such as sports shoes. Later this summer, Vasilev (nickname Zaptio) will co sponsor a virtual sports shoe company named RTFKT, with game developer Chris Le, and Benoit Pagotto, the brand director of professional electronic sports agency Fnatic.

RTFKT will sell customized sports shoes priced from 300 to 3000 dollars, and each pair of shoes will be accompanied by a virtual version. Customers can choose to carry shoes, or entrust us to keep solid shoes for them, and then use virtual sports shoes to display (virtual sports shoes are actually a AR filter, which can be accessed through RTFKT application).

"Social media is an important part of the culture of sports shoes. Our business model allows children to show their new sneakers without having to open the box," Vasilev said.

　 Repair loopholes in fashion production process

Google, Apple, Amazon and other technology companies have a strong AR and VR research team, and billions of dollars have been invested in it.

Instagram has also entered the field of virtual fashion. Facebook's Spark AR studio, founded in 2017, is dedicated to designing filters and special effects for Instagram's Stories column. In May this year, the studio announced that it would open the technology to allow anyone to create custom filters. Although most of the filters currently function to change facial expressions, Pagotto said: "ultimately, this technology will allow users to enhance other parts of the body and external environment. Once people begin to pay attention to other parts of the body, they will stimulate the demand for virtual products such as clothing or sports shoes.

Although the future of the virtual world is broad, there are still many uncertainties. After all, the pioneering companies in this field are living on the edge, hoping that the virtual reality technology can become the mainstream.

Some designers look at virtual fashion from an environmental perspective, hoping to reduce unnecessary waste with this technology.

Facebook France's virtual reality Hard Suits Inc Oculus Clement Balavoine, joined the digital fashion designer Janis Sne of Adidas headquarters in Germany, founded the fashion brand Neuro Studios. In the past few years, two entrepreneurs have been exploring virtual fashion.

Create a process chart for virtual clothing. Picture source: Neuro Studios

The products of Neuro Studios include multi-functional vest, high waist sports pants and short jacket and so on. The price is between 200 US dollars and 500 dollars, and every dress is built by 3D model before reproducing. Although Neuro Studios has sold only more than 10 products, according to Balavoine, their goal at this stage is not to make profits, but to prove that a sustainable, technology driven apparel supply chain is effective.

"We are trying to promote a new concept," Balavoine said. Because we found that the garment manufacturing industry has not changed the way of production for decades, and this production process is extremely wasteful of resources. Virtual fashion is much more environmentally friendly.

Some brands also use virtual images to investigate customer preferences. Earlier this year, Claudette, a clothing company in New York, tested a product on the role of CGI Instagram, called Cade, which was created by start-up SparkCGI. Cade is a 15 year old net red with blond hair and blue eyes and a Claudette round neck shirt. She has 100 thousand fans on Instagram. Claudette designer Layan al-Dabbous said that virtual fashion enabled them to test consumer preferences for clothing before producing physical products.

She said, "fans of Cade love this shirt very much, and they always send private letters asking where they can buy the same clothes. I don't even know the existence of virtual fashion, but Cade also proves that in the future, this is indeed a good way to promote clothing and test consumer preferences.

Kerry Murphy is the founder of Fabricant, the company that Ma buys for his wife's virtual costume. Virtual fashion can at least optimize the sample delivery process, Murphy said.

Fabricant recently produced a virtual catalog of the latest series of clothing for Italy's brand Napapijri, VF. Napapijri plans to use these virtual directories at retail summit. Murphy says virtual clothing can reduce waste because they do not have to distribute physical samples for each customer.

This type of technology has been adopted by some companies, such as Ann Taylor, BetaBrand and Hugo Boss. These companies use virtual garment parts to replace samples in the design process, and fashion supply chain company Li Feng also does. Murphy once said that once the technology penetrated all the mainstream companies, he was optimistic that the fashion industry could reduce waste.

"The design industry is ridiculous, reminds me of the past in the movie industry, and implements manual cutting." Murphy also said, "they are constantly trying and making mistakes, and when digital tools come around, they have already created a lot of waste. Now we can reuse, recycle, change templates and think ahead with digital directory. It saves money and saves time.