Following on from London Fashion Week each season, a four-day London Fashion Week Festival is held. The intent to is offer consumers an exclusive Fashion Week experience. The event is held at at The Store Studios, 180 The Strand. This year, there were signs of emerging technology in use and one catwalk range was focused on cyber sports, fusing smart tech ideas with new clothing styles.
The focus of London Fashion Week is to enable consumers to shop a specially curated edit of designer collections as well as to sit close by the catwalk and view shows featuring London Fashion Week designers.
For many people attending the event provides an opportunity to get a head start on the key trends of the coming season. There are also talks given by industry experts.
Although shopping is important, those interested in fashion are increasingly turning to apps via mobile devices in order to following trends and to make purchases. According to Red Byte, fashion-interested people spend more time looking for a product on the fashion apps when they read about a new trend in the market compared with those who use apps for other purposes. This means that at an event like London Fashion Week attendees can examine products like shoes:
Those unable to attend can try out emerging technologies like augmented reality.
As well as keeping in touch with the latest technology, London Fashion Week was not immune from political events either. Logo t-shirts are back in fashion, and there were several references, in terms of design and mention, to the #metoo campaign.
The main catwalk shows were based on the themes of vintage clothing; new wave, and in a nod to technological times, cyber sports.
Also featured were designers like stylist Nicola Formichetti, who is known for Latex-heavy fashion collaborations with Lady Gaga, and for the reimagining of denim giant Diesel. Formichetti’s brand is Nicopanda.
With the vintage range the emphasis was on merging styles of yesteryear with a modern look. This included sun-baked hues; a range of tropical prints together with sunshine-worthy patterns, plus an assortment of shade-throwing sun hats with multiple pairs of vintage sunglasses.
The new wave creations tended towards graphic slashes of color, especially black, white, red, plus strong-shouldered tailoring.
The technological focus was exemplified through the cyber sport selection. Here new sportswear blended memories (for some) of Nineties Ibiza nights with super-technical performance clothing. Here are some examples:
A few more examples are displayed in the following video:
The technological aspect was more thematic than the clothing itself embracing wearable technology. However, technology featured in other areas too, such as a new app designed to call out for a home massage.
Also many of the stores selling ware had websites and some offered fashion apps, designed to help shopper to put their wardrobe together.
Out of all the branded apps available on phones, it is estimated 17 percent belong to the fashion industry, covering luxury brands, high street apparel labels, shoes, and outdoor gear. Many apps focus on building brand loyalty, such as by offering services through mobile applications.