Sustainable Fashion x Metaverse

Since the height of the COVID-19 pandemic, the metaverse has been a trending concept. With technologies like augmented reality (AR) and virtual reality (VR), users are immersing themselves into a space of interactivity that mirrors the real world. While many may feel this shift acts as an escape from our reality and the real problems that we as individuals face daily, companies are seeking the metaverse as a way to tackle these issues.

Many believe the fashion industry is the second most polluting industry in the world, after the oil and gas sector. Fashion runs on a cyclical nature with two different seasons per year to launch new items, with the clothing itself lasting a lot longer than a season–thus leaving room for waste. With sustainability being a leading megatrend, the fashion industry is looking to AR and VR to significantly cut back on production, reproduction and the waste created in the process. From fully virtual showrooms to launches and events, luxury fashion houses and tech brands are using the metaverse to create a venue for fashion gatherings, a place to hang out, play and shop. But the question remains: How sustainable is metaverse fashion?

What is the metaverse?

The metaverse is a virtual space created within the internet using 3D technologies. Users are then immersed into a virtual space where they can do everything they do in real life, such as visiting exciting locations, meeting people, shopping, buying and/or or selling real estate. The metaverse serves as a platform for creating, owning and monetizing digital assets.

What is its role in/impact on the fashion industry?

The metaverse allows users to experiment with fashion, target new demographics and markets, and reduce the need for retail outlets–which are expensive to operate and cost a lot of utilities to maintain. And though the metaverse’s creation runs the risk of releasing emissions, the virtual world has the potential to meet consumers’ desires without actually producing them. Doing so, the industry can finally slow down its raw materials supply and have more resources to better process waste. Metaverse fashion takes two primary forms: a combination of physical and digital–where clothing can be worn using augmented or virtual realities–and fully digital–where items are sold directly to an avatar or as NFTs.

According to Olga Chernysheva, chief sustainability officer at DressX, “The production of digital items can, on average, reduce the carbon footprint by 97%, in comparison to the production of the physical items.” Using AR and VR technologies, players can experiment with materials and patterns, creating the next virtual wardrobe for their avatar. Additionally, users can remix and recycle garments to earn rare elements to create unique wardrobes. With this shift, companies can design a product using virtual design production rather than traditional sketches and physical samples, thus saving materials in the design process.

Recent research conducted by The Business of Fashion shows that 72% of U.S. consumers accessed a virtual world in the past year, with 50% of consumers expressing an interest in buying a digital asset. The rise in popularity of the fashion metaverse can be credited to the creativity and exploration that comes with this space. Beyond the ability to style oneself virtually with an avatar, users can attend fully virtual showrooms, launches and events–hosted by luxury fashion houses–while promoting sustainable fashion. Users are then able to purchase a version of the garment seen in the virtual showrooms that they would like to buy to post on social media, without the waste of physical resources that come with the production process.

Companies Using the Metaverse to Drive Sustainable Fashion

Dolce & Gabbana

Dolce & Gabbana held its first Metaverse Fashion Week in 2020. The show was hosted by Decentraland in partnership with UNXD–a curated NFT marketplace for the best of digital luxury and culture. The collection included 20 virtual looks, designed to celebrate the creativity and innovation of this technology space. The looks remained viewable at the exclusive Dolce & Gabbana pop-up in Decentraland’s Luxury Fashion District until March 27th. Additionally, the brand released DGFamily, an exclusive NFT (Non-Fungible Token) community that offers a unique ecosystem of benefits for holders (e.g., exclusive drops, physical and digital events, and collaborations).

Tommy Hilfiger

Tommy Hilfiger participated in Decentraland's 2022 Metaverse Fashion Week. The brand showcased its Spring 2022 collections and hosted a digital retail platform for consumers to shop NFTs for their avatars and purchase physical items from within the metaverse. Tommy Hilfiger collaborated with Boston Protocol–a decentralized network that enables anyone to sell physical products in the metaverse as NFTs within its space (Boson Portal)–to launch its digital retail platform. The brand’s participation in the Metaverse Fashion Week followed its 2020 launch of “Tommy Island” in Animal Crossing, its Roblox partnership in 2021, and the 2022 launch of Team Tommy–a community-led gaming initiative for global creatives in the gaming domain.

Gucci

In May of 2021, Gucci created a virtual pop-up–Gucci Garden–on the online gaming platform Roblox. The pop-up allowed the brand to sell its designs, featuring handbags and accessories that could be valued in real currency. One of Gucci’s bags sold for $4000 in Gucci’s Garden, more than the actual, physical one. Additionally, the fashion house collaborated with competitive gaming platform FACEIT to create the Gucci Gaming Academy, an academy designed to empower young esports talent by cultivating their skills and amplifying their opportunities. Gucci is now accepting payments in cryptocurrency in some of its U.S. stores through a QR code where buyers can make payments from their crypto wallets.

Nike

In November of 2021, Nike collaborated with online game platform Roblox to create its own version of the metaverse, Nikeland. Nikeland allowed users to try on virtual products, in addition to playing to the strengths of Roblox as a platform with games such as tag and dodgeball. Since the launch of the event, Nike has reported that its revenues for the third quarter ending on February 28 totaled $10.9 billion, up 5% on a year-over-year basis. Nike’s digital sales in the latest quarter rose 19% from the prior year, fueled by 33% growth in North America. Nike also launched its first pair of digital sneakers in 2022 after its acquisition of the virtual fashion start-up RTFKT in 2021.

H&M

On January 4, H&M collaborated with Roblox and launched Loooptopia, an immersive “circular” gaming experience. In the game, players can collect coins to open loot boxes filled with an array of fabrics in different colors, materials and textures–which are then placed into a machine to create over 1,000 different in-game digital garments. Loooptopia is H&M’s latest digital fashion launch focused on sustainability.

Fashion houses like Paco Rabanne, Etro, Hermès and many more have also entered into the metaverse with a goal to offer sustainable fashion and provide ethical means of production in the fashion industry. The Metaverse Fashion Week continues to be one of the largest digital spaces for the world's top luxury fashion houses to showcase their designs to virtual attendees and cut back on production, reproduction and the waste created in the process.

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