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Four strategic scenarios for the Fashion Week evolution
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“There’s something kind of obscene about what the industry looks like now,” remarked Joseph Altuzarra last week. In the fashion weeks season, it is not hard to see why. Instead of staging a show, Altuzarra opted for an intimate affair, reminiscent of his fashion beginnings.
At the opposite end of the spectrum are the SuperBowls of fashion, or LV Menswear shows. Their success is measured in media impressions.
Both have the same purpose to present a designer’s upcoming seasonal collection to media, buyers, and the public. But their diverging formats reveal the complexity of the modern fashion landscape, shaped by sustainability pressures, dramatic growth mandates, PE overtakes, conglomeration, and increasing regulation.
The outcome is that one quite knows what to make of fashion weeks, and with a good reason: there are calls to cancel them, pressures on emerging designers to show at them, questions of value of content surrounding them, questions of their commercial worth for everyone included. Above it all are debates about fashion week’s purpose.
If there is one winning format, it is probably the Copenhagen Fashion Week, which asks all of the above but also puts together a considered program that mixes fashion shows with talks and panels and collaborative industry dinners. There is something for everyone, and the fashion week itself is a twice-a-year gathering of fashion professionals rather than a pure show.
Reimagining the fashion week is a long-term endeavor, but there are four strategic scenarios to offer a good starting point. (Overall, what will work best is to avoid self-consciousness that often accompanies fashion industry and approach the assignment practically).
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