• Fashion and music exist in mutual creativity, both acting as a zeitgeist for whatever the era’s trends and sentiments.
• Hip-hop in particular is enjoyed by a large portion of younger generations, and as a result fashion trends tend to crop up from the genre.
• Heuritech’s analysis of hip-hop music videos reveals the top fashion trends of 2019 and 2020, from Yo Gotti in fur to Ninho in checkers.

Fashion and music are inextricably linked. And they always have been, from Michael Jackson’s shiny glove to Pharrell’s vintage Vivienne Westwood hat. It’s not uncommon that a musical artist is the pioneer of a fashion trend, or even a fashion movement, it’s all about the universe the musician creates. And between Gen Z and millennials’ attachment to social media and penchant for the hip-hop genre, the interaction between fashion and music has never been so rapid fire. Cite Kanye West and his namesake brand Yeezy comes to mind; cite Tupac and one pictures a red bandana and gold chains.

These associations exist largely thanks to music videos, an art form in its modern form taking off in the 1980s with the rise of MTV. Today, music videos are diffused across social media to be watched on YouTube and other platforms by millions of fans, and with each album release it seems fans expect at least one or two videos to follow. Fashion brands haven’t let these numbers escape them: in Travis Scott’s music video for the song SICKO MODE, for example, he mentions the brand Nike, and has since been collaborating with the sportswear giant on their signature Air Force 1s. Moments like these speak to the power of images over fashion trends. So what are some of fashion’s major trends in hip-hop music videos in particular?

Fashion trends in the past year’s hip-hop music videos on YouTube

To answer this question, Heuritech analyzed over 600 of the most popular hip-hop music videos on YouTube across 2019 and 2020 in the US and France. Heuritech applied its in-house image recognition technology to do so, a method which allows for the detection of over 2000 attributes and products in each frame, like texture, color, model, and much more. Over the past year, five main trends stood out in some of hip-hop’s top music videos:

1. FUR

Of the music videos analyzed, 18% featured some sort of fur, most often worn on coats. It’s a classic look: big fur coat, ostentatious jewelry, hype entourage. In Dadju’s video for “Sous Controle” featuring Niska, the rapper walks into a mansion sporting a long fur coat before jumping into the song itself. In Yo Gotti’s video for “Put A Date On It” featuring Da Baby, Gotti stands at the head of a long dining table donning a red coat embellished with a fur collar. The fur coat is a symbol of beyond-rich, it’s why the look fits in so well with the hip-hop universe. Fur is a status symbol that’s stood the test of time, even in modern rap.

2. NEON & FLUORESCENT

From neon yellow to lime green, fluorescent colors were heavily featured in 2019 and 2020’s rap videos on YouTube with an 11% share. Featuring Nicki Minaj and Ty Dolla $ign, Megan Thee Stallion’s breakout video “Hot Girl Summer” is filled to the brim with girls in neon green, pink, blue, and more, with some of the set props even awash with fluorescence. Rich the Kid’s video for “Save That”includes children dressed in neon, dancing through a grocery store to the rapper’s music and even joining him to dance at times, equally dressed in a brilliant yellow. At times fluorescent colors tend to communicate a sort of futuristic, almost technological mood, while other times they evoke unbridled energy and enthusiasm. Rich the Kid and Megan Thee Stallion include neon colors as a way to transmit each mood through their music videos, respectively.

3. TANK TOPS

Call it what you may — singlet, string vest, undershirt, Guinea tee — men’s tank tops weren’t missed in hip-hop music videos. With a 10% share of the videos analyzed, this item was exclusively worn in black or white, typically with the rap-classic gold or silver chains to amp up the look. NLE Choppa’s “Shotta Flow Remix” featuring Blueface takes place at a backyard barbecue, where the rapper is dressed in the embodiment of summer relaxation: oversized jeans and a jersey tank top.

4. DENIM

Denim is one of those classic 90s and 2000s trends, from oversized jeans to denim trucker hats. This year, the trend has cycled back in smaller proportions: fitted skinny jeans, with rips or even acid wash, are a major hit. The trend appears in 17% of all music videos analyzed, which is no small number. In Kaza’s video for “Béni” featuring Maes, the rappers are filmed in front of suburban buildings, and Maes along with members of their entourage are sporting slim, ripped jeans with oversized jackets. K Camp’s music video for “Ice Cold” takes place in a 90s-style house, and again, the rapper wears ripped jeans with an oversized jacket.

5. CHECKERED

Checkers aren’t always an easy pattern to wear outside of prep school and 221b Baker Street, but this year’s hip-hop artists are breathing life into the preppy print. The pattern appeared in 11% of the music videos analyzed, often on flannel overshirts and jackets. Kpoint’s “Ma 6t a craqué” featuring Ninho, and DaBaby’s “Find My Way” are two videos in which both rappers appear in red and black checkered overshirts, à la Kurt Cobain. In Kodak Black’s “Calling My Spirit,” the women featured in the video sport black-and-white checkered jumpsuits.

Hip-hop meets high fashion

And when it comes to analyzing fashion trends, hip-hop music videos are a good place to look, particularly those posted to YouTube. In Nielsen Music’s 2020 mid-year report, the music sales tracking company reported that hip-hop is the top genre in the US and France this year. It’s not surprising given that the two countries are the top two producers of hip-hop in the world, which also helps to explain luxury brands’ interest in rappers and their videos. In the last two years alone, brands from Louis Vuitton to Saint Laurent have released rap-fronted campaigns to draw in younger customers. “It is from rap and music video that followers are able to determine and validate their assumptions about their lifestyle decisions, including apparel expressions,” states Cornell Professor Van Dyk Lewis.

And the list of collaborations between rappers and designers thanks to their lyrics and music videos is seemingly exhaustive, dating back to even the 80s. Run-DMC’s 1986 song My Adidas scored the group a million-dollar endorsement, a deal unheard of at the time. Since, the list has only grown, including Versace collabing with 2 Chainz on a sneaker, Dior selecting S.Pri Noir as the face of a fragrance campaign, and Chanel partnering with Pharrell on a 2019 collection. Consumers see these collaborations, and they want what they see. Genius notes that in 2018, “the three most-referenced fashion brands–Fendi, Balenciaga, and Gucci–were called out 664 times in rap and R&B songs.” While fashion and music is no one-way street, can anyone be surprised that these brands are some of the most-desired by younger consumers today?

The power of music videos in hip-hop’s fashion trends

Fashion and music exist in mutual creativity, and it’s clear that their expression is often appreciated via music video. These videos seem frozen in time when one looks back, and in a way they are fashion’s living archives.

When Ja Rule wore a rare Burberry bucket hat in his music video for “Always on Time,” many fans of hip-hop discovered the famous tartan pattern for the first time, and the brand has been present in rappers’ outfits ever since. When A$AP Rocky wore and mentioned Dior in more than a few of his music videos, he became a face of Dior Homme shortly thereafter in 2016. When PNL appeared in custom Off-White in their music video for “Au DD,” a capsule collection between the French rap duo and Virgil Abloh was announced not long after.

There are seemingly endless instances of rappers mixing with high fashion, and more and more, it seems to go the other way around, with brands instead approaching rappers. The reach of these artists on fashion trends is further backed by Heuritech’s analysis of the past year’s top five trends drawn from hip-hop’s top music videos on YouTube: fur, neon, tank tops, denim, and checkered.

The year’s top fashion trends in hip-hop, as seen on YouTube was originally published in Heuritech, a Luxurynsight Company on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.

• Brands are eager to find the best way to be present on TikTok, in the hopes of engaging with the platform’s young user base
• High potential for user engagement seems to be the key for success on the platform, with tutorial videos and challenges being amongst the most popular video formats
• TikTok communities have influenced style, with Celine’s SS21 menswear collection titled “The Dancing Kid” being one of the latest examples of this phenomenon

This summer, a number of young TikTok stars including Chase Hudson (@lilhuddy) and Noen Eubanks (@noeneubanks) served as the face of Celine, with creative director Hedi Slimane’s SS21 Gen Z-inspired collection titled “Dancing Kid”, solidifying TikTok’s vital role in the fashion ecosystem. The video sharing platform is particularly popular amongst Gen Z, who represent the largest segment of its user base. Thus, it comes as no surprise that luxury brands are eager to figure out how to effectively engage with TikTok users in the hopes of attracting Gen Z to their brands.

Virality on TikTok

However, going viral on TikTok is a major challenge for even the biggest brands, as the type of content that is popular on Instagram often does not perform well on TikTok. This is partially because, compared to Instagram, TikTok is described as being more “authentic” and “spontaneous,”with the opportunity for user engagement being an important aspect of a video’s success.

Popular video formats on TikTok include various “challenges”, educational videos, and, of course, lip syncing and dancing. Since the popularity of these video formats rely on the mass participation of the TikTok community, with users recreating their version of a viral dance, for instance, it is clear that a high potential for user engagement seems to be the key for success on the platform.

Another idiosyncrasy of TikTok compared to other social media is that the content itself is ostensibly more important than the user creating it. While there are clearly anomalies to this tendency, as TikTok influencers do exist (take the Hype House, for one), it is much more difficult for fashion brands or celebrities to be successful on the platform simply because they are well known. According to an article published by Business of Fashion, the best way for brands to benefit from TikTok is “either by inventing a meme that catches on with users or, more often than not, finding a way to capitalise on content that went viral organically.”

Fashion brands trending on TikTok

With this in mind, it makes sense why brands are struggling to be successful on the platform, as engineering a viral moment is difficult, and having one organically appear is pure luck. Gucci is the latest luxury brand to benefit from a viral TikTok moment, with the #GucciModelChallenge where TikTokers emulate the brand’s signature kitschy aesthetic by creating looks from their own wardrobe. At the time of writing this article, this hashtag has generated over 14.5 million views despite Gucci having zero involvement in creating the challenge.

The “democratic” nature of the platform, where seemingly anyone can become famous if their content resonates with fellow TikTok users, is exactly what makes the app so appealing. For instance, a JW Anderson patchwork crochet cardigan went viral after Harry Styles was seen wearing it during a rehearsal on The Today Show. Being priced at 1450€, far beyond the budget of most Gen Zers, one TikTok user, Liv Huffman (@lilbittylivie) created her own version of the cardigan in a video that reached 3.6 million views, and inspired thousands of other users to recreate their version of the garment. Following this explosion on TikTok, JW Anderson even released the pattern for the cardigan to encourage others to participate in this DIY trend.

This example is emblematic of the type of content that is well suited to TikTok — according to a recent article by Vogue Business, “Whenever you’re teaching people something, your engagement is higher,” which is logical as users are inspired to recreate the content of the video. The prominent DIY community on TikTok is related to the fact that Gen Zers tend to be more environmentally conscious than previous generations, and appreciate hand-made garments.

Moreover, due to the pandemic, people are spending more time at home and on their devices, with more time to develop hobbies, making the DIY trend particularly relevant for 2020. In fact, the term “craftcore” has recently emerged, describing this hand-made aesthetic and practice, with tie dye, patchwork, and crochet being some stylistic elements of this new subculture.

Despite the environmental awareness of Gen Z, it is important to mention that fast fashion brands like Boohoo or PrettyLittleThing are still finding success on the platform. Boohoo created a TikTok song along with a challenge, tagged #Itsfromboohoo generating 122.7 million views, while PLT’s #prettychallenge has 34.8 million.

Trending subcultures in fashion on the platform

The dialogue between fashion and TikTok is informed by the distinctive subcultures that emerge on the platform. For example, Celine’s most recent men’s collection was inspired by the “eboy” aesthetic that describes a specific archetype of Gen Z, with chunky chains, oversized cardigans, and clashing patterns being the token elements of the style.

Although it is unclear where subcultures like the eboy/egirl or craftcore begin, TikTok certainly nurtures the development of these communities, making the platform an indispensable form of social media in the fashion industry. TikTok presents a change to the “influencer industry”, because brands and celebrities cannot rely solely on their fame to succeed on the platform. Rather, they must create engaging content, like challenges or tutorial style videos that encourage user interaction, in order to be popular on TikTok.

The future of TikTok fashion trends

Although brand exposure on TikTok sometimes arises by chance, with the #GucciModelChallenge or JW Anderson sweater, it is clear that if fashion brands want their content to go viral on the platform they need to invent new ways to encourage users to engage with their content.

This is where data drawn from the platform can be highly valuable to brands seeking to peer into the daily behavior of its users: Heuritech analyzes images and videos shared on social media in order to historicize and predict fashion trends. Because trends evolve so rapidly on TikTok, it is key to be able to assess thousands, even millions, of images per day. Heuritech currently analyzes over 3 million images per day on Instagram alone — the possibilities for TikTok are good news for luxury brands seeking to be first string in fashion trends. In any case, TikTok’s influence in fashion attests to the importance of social media in predicting future trends, offering a snapshot of consumer behaviours and preferences in the virtual realm.

How Can Fashion Brands Go Viral on TikTok in 2020? was originally published in Heuritech, a Luxurynsight Company on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.

• Men’s SS21 digital fashion week represents a turning point in the fashion world, being the first major digital fashion week following Haute Couture, with designers creating innovative new ways of presenting their collections, challenging the traditional format of the fashion show
• Following this period of crisis, brands are questioning their reason to exist, with the meaning and intention behind their collections being equally as important as the garments themselves
• A major theme this fashion week was a “return to nature”, with designers showing a renewed appreciation for the natural environment, and favouring more artisanal materials and textiles that require a high level of craftsmanship

This men’s SS21 digital fashion week was a pivotal moment for the fashion world, with both independent designers and luxury maisons being tasked with the challenge of somehow translating the experience of attending a show IRL to the virtual realm. Although there is no true replacement to the “real thing”, many designers took advantage of this unique opportunity to challenge the format of a traditional fashion show, and utilize the possibilities afforded by technology to communicate with their audience in a novel way. Another first related to this (almost) exclusively digital fashion week is the democratization of the viewing experience, as would-be fashion show attendees and the “average” person both see the collection through the screen of their devices.

Brands were forced to adapt to this new reality, with many coming up with highly innovative ways of presenting their collections in the digital realm. UNDERCOVER’s collection was completely rendered in 3D, with models appearing like avatars from Grand Theft Auto; Sunnei’s “Canvas” collection utilizes CGI to depict models wearing white garments that are completely customisable through the brand’s VR platform; COOL™ created an interactive experience using VR; Kolor’s Junichi Abe developed a 360 degree camera system so viewers can see each look from every angle.

Narration to Convey Emotion

In addition to experimenting with the format of the digital fashion show, several designers took a philosophical approach in attempting to convey a deeper meaning behind the collection that goes beyond the physical garments. A distinctive theme that emerged this fashion week is using narration to convey a sense of emotion, with designers’ videos featuring poetry, novel excerpts, home-video audio recordings, and Nietzsche quotes dubbed over visuals. The Bolognese brand Magliano created a mythological universe, with each model embodying a fictitious character, featured in a video narrated by the novelist Isabella Santacroce. Luchino Magliano, founder of his eponymous label, explains that “Narration is the first form of augmented reality. We asked ourselves how we could overcome the virtual medium to convey the emotion and research behind each object, and we came to the conclusion that the word is the strongest medium.” Given the amount of designers who utilized narration to convey the story behind their collections, it is clear that many others would agree with Magliano.

Return to nature

Ironically, a prevailing theme this fashion week was a “return to nature”, despite collections only being presented in the digital realm. Numerous brands either focused on nature as a guiding theme, or incorporated the natural environment into their collections in some capacity, whether it be floral motifs, lookbooks shot amongst vegetation, or plants physically attached to garments. This gravitation towards nature is ostensibly related to the desire to convey a deeper meaning and a sense of emotion with viewers via the internet, as times of crisis often result in a renewed appreciation for beauty, especially after being locked indoors for several months.

Bohemian Inspiration

A key inspiration for this back to nature theme is the 60s and 70s, which is logical, since the aesthetics of these epochs are defined by political upheaval and a questioning of the established order. Since we are experiencing both of these phenomena today, this free-spirited, bohemian sensibility ostensibly resonates more strongly than it would otherwise, manifesting through the physical garments in the form of paisley, patchwork, ikat patterns, fringe, tinted aviators, and loose, flowing silhouettes, shown by brands like Children of the Discordance, Isabel Marant, Greg Lauren, Etro, and Magliano. Tunics, knitwear, and espadrilles were also token elements of this theme, shown by the brands that were inspired by this free-spirited, bohemian mood.

Hippy Streetwear

Another iteration of this natural theme comes from a more streetwear perspective, with brands such as Blue Marble, Etudes, and MSGM combining t-shirts, hoodies, as well as more tailored garments with the typical “hippy” accoutrements, like natural-dyed textiles, beads, rope accessories, psychedelic prints, and vibrant colours paired with muted, “sun-drenched” tones. These details emanate a sense of joy and optimism, with vibrant colours and hallucinogenic motifs symbolising a type of rebirth, as we are entering a new phase of life following this period of confinement. Massimo Giorgetti, creative director of MSGM, states that “for the first time in my life and in the life of the brand, I perceived the fall of the myth of the city as the place to be and the rise of a new desire for nature”. Clearly, Giorgetti is not alone in this desire to be connected to our natural world and have a fresh start.

Focus on Craftsmanship

Lastly, a key trend was a gravitation towards artisanal materials and techniques, with an abundance of embellishment, knits, linen, woven textiles, and embroidery representing a renewed appreciation for the craftsmanship required to create such garments. CMMN SWDN, Ermenegildo Zegna, and Jacquemus are a few examples of those who incorporated these artisanal elements into their collections, combining these “crafty” details with tailoring to create a level of sophistication. Some staple garments amongst brands that explored this theme include espadrilles, tunics, and loose fitting pants, typically in earthy, muted tones.

Ultimately, this fashion week seemed to predict, at least in part, a return to a time where collections were smaller, craftsmanship was rightfully given the spotlight, and nature was directly reflected in the product. In other ways, tradition was challenged, with the digitalisation of many catwalks and look books giving access to more than only industry insiders. What we do know is that these trends inspire us to keep our roots in the ground and our eyes to the sky.

Heuritech empowers fashion teams to monitor in real time both products and trends through cutting-edge image recognition technology applied on millions of social media images every day. If you want to know more, get in touch at info@heuritech.com

Quarantine Rebirth: Men’s Fashion Week Review SS21 was originally published in Heuritech, a Luxurynsight Company on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.

Heuritech’s Fashion Content Manager, Mélanie Mollard, interviewed Chief Purchasing Officer Sylwia Wennberg and Brand and Marketing Director Natasha Billing to delve deeper into how NA-KD has managed to capture Europe’s fashion market using digital solutions.

Mélanie Mollard: Can you explain the story of your brand?

Sylwia Wennberg: Our foundation has always been to be very open and interactive with our customers, so from the beginning it’s been very consumer-centric. Initially, our concept was to sell everything from all different brands and all different price points. But we noticed quickly that once we started listening to our customers, they actually preferred our products rather than those from external brands. In 2017, for example, 30% to 40% of our business consisted of external brands. But with data from our social media, we realized we needed to push our own products, and our brand DNA developed organically from that point. We still have external brands, of course, but it’s become more of a heritage business. We’ve managed to keep a high percentage of returning customers, and I think that’s because we make it easy for them to identify themselves with the NA-KD brand.

Natasha Billing: Our initial proposition was indeed multi-brand focused, but as Sylwia said, we evolved quickly once we noticed that our brand was outperforming external ones. Our product collaborations with influencers in particular delivered significant uplift for us, and generally speaking, these collabs always performed better than some of the other products from brand partners. That proposition seems to resonate regardless of the market. It’s given us more confidence to listen to what our customers are telling us, even if at times what they’re telling us feels counterintuitive.

MM: Your brand is interesting because you’re digitally native and have seemed to capture well the direction of the market. How do data and social media go hand in hand for you?

SW: To start, we have a massive advantage over those who don’t share their sales channels between brick-and-mortar and online. We’re lucky to have all of our data in our data warehouse, so we can interpret this data how we want and use it for trend forecasting. What’s interesting about using tools like Heuritech is that it gives us a broad look at product performance across the entire market. For example, at the beginning of the pandemic we had planned a prom collection, but through data it became obvious that consumers were turning away from prom wear in favor of comfortable loungewear. Our teams, particularly our business intelligence team, were able to turn this around quickly and determine which collection would be more relevant. Our ability to incorporate internal data and external data from companies like Heuritech, coupled with our strong brand identity, really is our “secret sauce.”

NB: I completely agree. I also think we’re the perfect size to evolve on a very reactive basis: it’s one of the reasons we’ve been as successful as we have. We’re always looking ahead to the next challenge, and we’ve always got our eye on the future.

MM: Do you think the way you approach your customers’ desires comes from being a digitally native brand and being strategic with social media platforms like Instagram?

NB: We jumped onto Instagram quite quickly and used influencers early on — we’re very data-driven in that respect. It’s a mature platform for us and we have a deep understanding of what’s happening on those platforms from both an organic and a paid point of view. With that said, we don’t want to be wedded to one specific platform, so we’ve developed a much more platform-agnostic approach these days. YouTube and TikTok in particular represent a real opportunity that have been under-potentialized, and we’ve been developing these channels more and more. Social channels such as these give us the benefit of understanding what’s happening within our own ecosystem, but more importantly spotting opportunities through the work we do with our influencer partners.

MM: How has TikTok been for your brand? It’s taken off in the past year especially, and brands are only just starting to take advantage of it. I’m thinking of J.W. Anderson’s recent success which happened very organically. What’s your strategy?

NB: TikTok is an organic channel for us and we’ve put a significant amount of effort and investment behind growing our account. The model we’ve used is not dissimilar to the playbook we’ve used for some of our other platforms, so it’s a combination of self-created content from our internal teams and influencer-created content via collabs. We’ve focused on partnering with the best and most exciting talent who we can learn and benefit from, from the point of view of co-creating content with them as well as identifying product collaboration ideas with the aim of being creative together. Our brand strategy is understanding as much as we can about the platform and collaborating with people that we know natively understand how to make the most of them.

MM: Social media has been increasingly useful for you. What about optimizing your functionalities during the pandemic?

SW: The initial supply chain disaster that hit China and India, for example, didn’t affect us significantly because we plan our collections on a very short production cycle and most of our production is done in Turkey. We don’t produce massive quantities, so we don’t need to hedge or spread the risk elsewhere.

MM: In terms of growth strategy, how have you maintained social media engagement throughout the pandemic, or has the pandemic naturally benefitted your engagement?

NB: We’re lucky in that we’re still a small brand, so we’re able to pivot and evolve as quickly as possible. Internally, we’ve recalibrated ourselves to be much more data-driven in an integrated way than we were just six months ago. We have regular touchpoints with all different parts of the business, so where there used to be silos, there aren’t any more. For example, we have the advantage of managing all of our production internally, so we can turn things around quickly versus other competitors who are used to much longer briefing cycles. Then from a content point of view, we spend a huge amount of time watching what’s happening on different social media platforms. As a digitally native brand, this has allowed us to respond to the signals we see quite quickly, and we’ve seen good engagement and response on the back of that.

MM: You decide on products by closely following social media and looking at your data. What are your most successful markets today?

SW: Sweden is of course our home market so that’s where we’re most mature: we’re about 25% penetrated here, and at least 3 out of 10 Swedish girls between the ages of 18 and 30 follow NA-KD on Instagram. Germany is our biggest market, though, with 30% to 40% of our sales. We don’t tend to look at our markets on this level, though, because it’s really all of Europe. Covid-19 especially has shown us this, because different markets respond differently given their maturity for our brand: mature markets like Sweden are more organic and don’t need much promotion from us, while newer markets in Europe respond well to our collaborations with influencers.

MM: You don’t separate your European markets, so to speak, but do you notice differences between what products are more successful in different countries?

SW: From a brand DNA point of view we’re very solid: we have a neo-Scandinavian aesthetic which is actually quite universal in Europe. We prefer to preserve our brand DNA, so we don’t tend to design collections specifically tailored to the market on the broader range. However, we do use our influencer collaborations to get a closer look at the market as we see fit. If the influencer is particularly trendsetting, we obviously want our collections to reflect her home market and style. At the end of the day, though, our collections are always quite clean and represent everyday wear.

MM: Because you follow data so closely, how does a company like Heuritech who specializes in data and its application to fashion, serve you strategically?

SW: You trace what is happening on social media, especially on Instagram, and this helps us to validate the things that we see. We look at what’s happening on the street, what high-street designers are producing, what our competitors are doing, and what social and political events will potentially impact fashion trends. Other pure players may only forecast trends by looking at catwalks, but we meld together the upward and downward funnels to get a wider scope of market trends. Your data backs a lot of these intuitions that we draw.

MM: Moving forward, have you taken any lessons from the pandemic period, or has your digital origin made it quite streamlined?

NB: More than anything, this period has given us a better understanding of the role that our wholesale business can bring to the table as a channel for communication. Even outside of the revenue, there are still customers of ours that want to look and feel the product in a way that feels tangible. I don’t think that we will underestimate the value that they can bring as a brand channel especially. We’re also continually challenging ourselves to be responsive and reactive so that any changes and opportunities that crop up can be taken advantage of.

MM: Traditional brands are having to turn their strategies around as data and digital become less indispensable, so you’re on the right track.

NB: There’s so many traditional brands that have to evolve overnight. The fact that traditional businesses have teams called ‘digital teams’ is beyond me — digital should be a cultural behaviour at this point that exists within the company itself. These are companies that will struggle the most moving forward.

Using advanced artificial intelligence (AI) to translate real-world images shared on social media into meaningful insights, Heuritech empowers brands to forecast demand and trends more accurately, produce more sustainably, and achieve unprecedented competitive advantage.

The strategy to gaining 2.8 million Instagram followers: An interview with NA-KD was originally published in Heuritech, a Luxurynsight Company on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.

• Mask visibility on social media varies between geographies: the trend is more common in Asian countries than in Europe and the US.
• For social media trends, influencers with fewer than 1,000 followers tend to post face mask content more often than bigger influencers to reflect relevant, daily life for many users.
• A long list of designers have started creating face masks after noticing the trend on social media and on the streets in a variety of patterns, colors, and styles.

Face masks have recently appeared at the forefront of fashion trends as a result of the Covid-19 pandemic. However, for different parts of the world, the adoption of this trend has developed at varying rates. In the West, it largely remains an accessory linked to medical professions, but the emergence of masks from major Western designers is changing this connotation. In contrast, masks have been a part of daily life in many Asian countries since far before the pandemic due to environmental and health reasons. The undeniable similarity, however, is that both Instagram and Weibo users have seen an increase in mask content since the arrival of Covid-19. Using image recognition technology, Heuritech endeavored to find out more about the spread of masks on social media, allowing the comparison of different behavior patterns depending on the typology and geography of Instagram and Weibo users.

So the question is: Will face masks become a fashion accessory in their own right, and will there continue to be differences between geographies?

How popular are face masks in different geographies?

Strongly represented in popular culture, especially in Japan, face masks are often synonymous with collective protection and civic duty. Far from hampering social relations and interactions, masks are worn for even the slightest cold without attracting any particular attention. Conversely, Western cultures are more disturbed by the wearing of the mask, which is considered to be a hindrance with the concealing quality being perceived as an obstacle to communication.

Logically, Asia remains the top geography for mask popularity according to Heuritech data. Even before Covid-19, the typical Japanese consumer used an average of 43 masks per year. Face masks are common in China and South Korea as well, and are considered an important protective barrier in heavily polluted cities. From mid-March to mid-May in China and Japan, the share of posts with masks represents around 4% of all posts with a human for these geographies, which is two times higher than in Europe. In the US, mask visibility sits at 2.8% of all posts featuring a person.

Since the mask is much newer in the West than in China or Japan, during the period of January to mid-May 2020, the share of posts featuring a human wearing a mask on Weibo was significantly higher than on Instagram. Nonetheless, the share of posts on Weibo with a human wearing a mask spiked in mid-January before stabilizing, while the share of Instagram posts didn’t peak until mid-March. Since then, this type of Instagram content has grown by 2.7 times.

What kind of social media users are posting face mask content most frequently?

Since the start of the pandemic, different types of influencers on Instagram have adapted their content to the times, in part motivated by the desire to set an example for others to follow the approved safety measures in each country.

Interestingly enough, less-followed influencers are more likely to post face mask content.Why? Because their posts tend to be more representative of daily life than others, like wearing a mask to the supermarket or in public transport. Amongst influencers with less than 1,000 followers, 2.5% of them posted face mask content between mid-March and mid-May 2020. Influencers with tens of thousands of followers, on the other hand, tend to be more picky in what they choose to post. Those with over 10,000 followers sit at about 1.5%, considerably less than their smaller counterparts.

Have face masks become a new fashion trend?

While some brands have remained mute on the accessory, many have gone into production for face masks at varying styles and prices. Some have even planned to incorporate masks in their next collections. Certain voices inside and outside of the fashion industry have already expressed some hesitation regarding fashion brands affixing logos on an essential good. However, it seems that the fashion industry has gone beyond and internalized the mask as a new social accessory.

Perhaps the fashion industry should have seen this trend coming — at the Grammy Awards earlier this year, Billie Eilish wore a Gucci face mask on the red carpet, pleasing fashion critics. Moreover, during this year’s Fall/Winter 2020 Fashion Month, Marine Serre led the pack with her avant-garde N95-esque mask, which happens to be sold out on most e-commerce websites. Brands of similar calibers including Celine and Off-White also featured masks in their collections.

In response to Covid-19, less high-street brands including Urban Outfitters, Prabal Gurung, Rag & Bone, Rowing Blazers, Lacoste, and many others, have begun cloth masks in varying patterns and styles.

There are also brands who have created face masks beyond the purposes of safety and accessorizing an outfit. Sportswear brand Under Armour has released a mask specifically for exercise, called the UA SPORTSMASK. The mask is water-resistant for all types of exercise, and the design allows the wearer to breathe more easily compared to a typical mask. Patrik Frisk, CEO of Under Armour, stated in an interview, “We specifically designed this mask for athletes and for all of us who want to exercise and train while also keeping ourselves, and those around us, safe.”

The future of face masks

While it may be too early to know the future for sure, masks are certainly at the center of fashion for the moment. This accessory has been common in many Asian countries for some time now for social and health reasons, but for the West, it’s still quite new. On both sides of the world, though, those who post their masks more often on social media are those with fewer followers, largely because these influencers are more reflective of daily life for the majority of people. Designers have caught on to this wave, as well, from the high street all the way to sportswear. Whether you’re a designer, an influencer, or neither-nor, social media is a useful way to gauge the popularity of face masks and the micro-trends among them.

For more analysis on masks on social media today, check out Heuritech.

How is the mask trend behaving on social media? was originally published in Heuritech, a Luxurynsight Company on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.

• Artificial Intelligence and fashion are two fields which have often misunderstood each other, but this is beginning to change as people recognize the creativity in both.
• AI is already being incorporated into many different artistic fields, including but not limited to painting, object design, and fashion design.
• When it comes to creativity, fashion designers are increasingly using artificial intelligence as a tool for innovation and improvement for a greener future.

The world’s oldest known human drawing dates back 73,000 years to a small stone in what is now South Africa, and the oldest known human painting dates back more than 40,000 years ago to Western Europe and Southeast Asia. Creativity in its purest form has been around nearly as long as modern humans: as defined by Margaret Boden in 1998, creativity is a fundamental activity of human information. It is characterized by two branches, generally speaking: “The ability to produce work that is both novel and appropriate.” In layman’s terms, creativity is the act of creating that which is original and adaptive.

But when it comes to fashion, is creativity inherently human?

The art of Artificial Intelligence

Nikoleta Kerinska, PhD in art sciences, stated, “Artificial intelligence can simulate creativity. But there is also the question of the artist’s intention. The human artist consciously works toward a creative or conceptual goal. A computer program does not have this same consciousness.”

The field of artificial intelligence as an academic discipline was first founded in 1956 at Dartmouth College in the United States. While advancements have been made in leaps and bounds since then, the definition of AI remains debated. The English Oxford Living Dictionary defines AI as such: The theory and development of computer systems able to perform tasks normally requiring human intelligence, such as visual perception, speech recognition, decision-making, and translation between languages. Merriam Webster gives a much more concise definition: the capability of a machine to imitate intelligent human behavior. Yet there runs one common thread through all accepted definitions of AI today, and that is technology which imitates human intelligence to, in some cases, outperform the human brain. Methods such as deep learning and machine learning work to this end, and learn from repetition and input not unlike a human.

But technology that can imitate the thinking processes of a human can be an unsettling thought, especially when the question of what creativity is comes into the picture. Creativity is a sense of pride: for many, creativity explains humankind’s progress throughout history, and it is this critical thinking that sets humans apart from the rest. For those in the creative fields, there is often suspicion toward artificial intelligence, because its connotations of hard logic seem to take away from the heart-on-sleeve process of traditional creatives. Yet 100 years ago, the idea of using the Internet was inconceivable, and today it has become an extension of the creative process. The Internet hasn’t replaced painting, or object design, or couture, has it? In the same way, artificial intelligence will be, and is already for some, a tool to take human creativity to new heights and to open doors we didn’t know existed.

AI in the creative fields today

So if artificial intelligence isn’t a distant future anymore, how is it being used within creative disciplines? Interestingly enough, AI is already being incorporated into many different artistic fields, including but not limited to painting, object design, and fashion design.

It’s hard to imagine a painting without a paintbrush in a human hand, but AI comes with surprises. Last year in February, there was something special about an exposition presented at the Gallery Vossen in Paris. Unlike other paintings, these paintings were not painted by a human hand. Robbie Barrat, an artist and researcher within the field of AI, teamed up painter Ronan Barrot to produce a marriage of human creativity and AI technology. Using deep learning to feed over 500 paintings from Ronan Barrot into the machine, the pair presented their human-inspired, machine-painted art to the world. With some scepticism, the concept was well-received, a marriage of human input and tech output.

In object design, another pair of minds had the same idea of joining human input to produce an artificially-made result: enter the chAIr Project, which was launched in 2018 between designers Philipp Schmitt and Steffen Weiss. The project was conceived with the goal of determining whether or not AI could indeed be as creative as a human designer, and the results were fascinating. They asked themselves: “Could a bot produce an object as symbolically rich as a chair, and with the aesthetic proficiency of an Eames or Breuer design?” The pair created a generative neural network (GAN) and fed into it a dataset of over 500 chair designs from the 20th century. In the end, the designers refined the machine’s creations down to 4 different chairs, all unconventional. So while AI cannot and should not replace designers, it might be a useful collaborative artistic tool, as evidenced by the chAIr Project.

When it comes to scepticism toward creativity, AI is perhaps most salient within fashion, whether it be collection planning or design itself. The foundation has taken years to be built: for example, at Burberry’s 2010 Fall/Winter show in London, the collection was streamed live using 3D technology to guests at private locations in New York, LA, Paris, Tokyo, and Dubai. At the time, this was revolutionary, and it seems Covid-19 has brought back the digital fashion show full circle.

The gaming industry equally played its part in paving the way for fashion without even knowing it. Games such as World of Warcraft and Fortnight have been selling skins for over two decades, and few could have predicted this concept would one day be translated to the average consumer’s real-life wardrobe. The 3D AI technology used for video games renders characters more lifelike with details such as natural bodily movements, facial expressions, and fabrics which flow in the wind or against the body. In turn, this technology is used more and more in fashion to analyze and reproduce the true nature of fabric and fit for consumers to create real-life or digital clothing. Additionally, the digital clothing industry is a viable solution to waste and pollution issues, and it fits in with the social media generations of today: it has the potential to represent 1% of the fashion market share at $25 billion.

Many experts are betting that 3D and AI technology will stay for a variety of different reasons, most notably because of its potential to pinpoint precise consumer desires and in turn to reduce excessive waste. Founder of Amsterdam-based brand The Fabricant, who uses 3D AI technology to produce its clothing, stated “Our work exists beyond the current concepts of catwalks, photographers, studios, and sample sizes. For The Fabricant, imagination is our only atelier, and our fashion stories are free from the constraints of the material world.” Similarly, CEO of Norway-based brand Carlings stated that he sees 3D collections as the future, and also a sustainable solution for the world, currently inundated with excess clothing waste.

Other designers are bringing artificial intelligence to the front lines: Japanese designer Yuima Nakazato is a designer who is pioneering the future of AI-infused fashion, and has even featured his bio-couture collection at Haute Couture Fashion Week in Paris. In his words, “Eventually, each and every garment will be unique and different.” How exactly? Nakazato uses 3D technology and personalized machines to make his creations: he first takes the client’s measurements using a 3D scanner, before transferring the data to a machine which directly cuts the different parts of the fabric to assemble the full garment. In this way, no material is wasted, and the customer receives exactly what they desire in the perfect size. This approach to design has the potential of inciting major changes, particularly for sustainability issues that are so present in the traditional clothing design and collection planning.

In another crossover between fashion and AI, Synflux is a collaboration between fashion designer Kazuya Kawasaki, Shimizu, designer Kotaro Sano, and machine learning engineer Yusuke Fujihira. Together, they are pushing the project entitled Algorithmic Couture. Using machine learning, Synflux generates optimized fashion pattern modules which are then modeled using computer-aided design software. The goal of this is to produce patterns that are zero waste as well as comfortable.

Given the ways people are already adapting artificial intelligence to their creative endeavors, it becomes difficult to assert that AI and creativity are mutually exclusive. AI is human-created, after all, and this technology is a tool rather than a remplacement: human creativity, like in thousand-year-old cave paintings, will always be the foundation of art. And with artificial intelligence, traditional creation is changing shape.

AI x Fashion as conducted by Heuritech

To bridge the gap between artificial intelligence and creativity, several PhDs in machine learning founded Heuritech on the premise that artificial intelligence could innovate the established ways of the fashion industry. Often in fashion, there is a distance between the creatives and the businesspeople, and Heuritech believes AI can provide these worlds a way to advance on the same page. This AI technology can assist fashion brands through predictive analytics that can provide insight into fashion trends, purchase patterns, and inventory-related guidance.

Determining what people want is the first step, and in the past, fashion brands have largely based this off of sales numbers and fashion shows. And while these metrics remain useful, social media has become a new creative space where consumers and designers alike express their favorite styles. In response, Heuritech developed a proprietary image recognition technology to analyze fashion images on social media. Millions and millions of pictures are shared each day on Instagram and other platforms, and are a good reflection of what’s happening in the real world. This technology allows for faster rationalization of data that were originally qualitative but that can now be quantitative: and while cold, hard numbers can sometimes be a repellant to creativity, these numbers are incredibly helpful for design and collection planning.

But of course, some within fashion are sceptical of incorporating AI into an industry built on creativity and imagination, but the goal of Heuritech’s AI technology is to accentuate this creativity. The question is not “Will AI replace fashion designers?” but rather “How can AI help fashion designers push the limits of their creativity?”

Heuritech gives designers and merchandisers the ability to employ a prediction model that is well-equipped to assist in creation. How exactly? This methodology provides a means for creatives to back their intuitions with tangible data, which can ultimately create a common language between fashion’s two faces: creatives and businesspeople. Creators, merchandisers, and salespeople could share a common vision with Heuritech’s machine learning algorithms who are able to predict trends up to one year in advance. In this way, technology can walk hand-in-hand with those in the creation process as well as those who manage post-creation. Fashion forecasting based on social media provides a unique opportunity to understand what different consumer audiences desire in real-time, and thus what to create for the season in question to accomodate market trends or to dare originality.

Furthermore, this AI technology addresses what several innovative designers are aiming to solve, as well: the sustainability issue of the fashion industry. Just as Yuima Nakazato aims to reduce apparel waste and improper collection planning, Heuritech’s technology serves a useful tool to do so. As explained, Heuritech’s image analysis can help with production and demand planning. Fashion trend forecasting allows for creatives to back their intuition with data, and for marketers and merchandisers to plan collections accordingly. In fact, trend detection with AI could reduce forecasting errors by 50% and overall inventory levels by 20–50% as per the State Of Fashion 2018 report by McKinsey and Business of Fashion. So by combining creative, human intuition with this AI technology, fashion brands can minimize overstock, streamline production, and optimize turnover.

Artificial Intelligence: A creative tool

Through numerous examples including Heuritech’s own technology, it seems AI is not a replacement for human creativity, but rather a tool to enhance it. It is the collaboration between the two that is novel and exciting, within the fashion industry in particular. Heuritech is evidence that AI is indeed human; it is only with human input that this technology can simulate imagination and creativity.

Bridging the gap between Artificial Intelligence and creativity in fashion was originally published in Heuritech, a Luxurynsight Company on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.

• European and US consumers are advancing cautiously in their post-Covid purchasing habits as confinement is being lifted and stores are reopening.
• Luxury and e-commerce are seeing a boost in China, with certain LVMH brands’ sales increasing by 50%, and ecommerce by 3%.
• Future spending on apparel in China is expected to drop by only 0–15% in May, while in Europe and the US it is expected to drop by 50%.

As Covid-19 progresses, consumer behaviors in different geographies continue to be affected by the pandemic in various ways. For example, in the first week of May a Shanghai shopping festival made $2.2 billion in the first 24 hours both online and in-store.

Download Heuritech’s full article for more.

Consumer behaviors during and post-Covid was originally published in Heuritech, a Luxurynsight Company on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.

• European and US consumers are advancing cautiously in their post-Covid purchasing habits as confinement is being lifted and stores are reopening.
• Luxury and e-commerce are seeing a boost in China, with certain LVMH brands’ sales increasing by 50%, and ecommerce by 3%.
• Future spending on apparel in China is expected to drop by only 0–15% in May, while in Europe and the US it is expected to drop by 50%.

During confinement, consumers spent significantly more time on Instagram, and Heuritech’s analysis found that people found new, creative ways to remain interested in fashion and foster healthy habits at home.

Heuritech empowers fashion teams to monitor in real time both products and trends through cutting-edge image recognition technology applied on millions of social media images every day. If you want to know more, get in touch at info@heuritech.com

Consumer attitudes in fashion during and post-confinement was originally published in Heuritech, a Luxurynsight Company on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.

• Fashion trends will vary across different geographies this summer as a result of the Covid-19 pandemic, and consumers are ready to transition confinement clothing into summer.
• During confinement, European and American consumers opted for sporty comfort, but this summer the trendiest fashion will be romantic and minimalist.
• Post-pandemic trends in China will reflect Chinese consumers’ optimism and celebration of freedom and fashion.

Fashion has always echoed the times: today, many in the industry are drawing parallels between changes in fashion trends after the second world war and the Covid-19 pandemic. Dior’s ‘New Look’was borne out of the post-war period, for example, and designers and consumers back home in the 40s became creative with what little resources they had. Today, the similarities are uncanny: as a result of the Covid-19 pandemic, fashion trends are indeed changing, and upcycling and repurposing are growing in popularity among consumers. With this in mind, different geographies have experienced the pandemic differently, and as such, fashion trends will vary this summer as the world slowly emerges from global quarantine. Consumers in Europe, the US, and China will be drawn to diverse trends in the coming months: so what does Heuritech predict?

Europe and the US: Sporty comfort is top confinement fashion

The buzzing topics on Instagram do a good job of documenting consumer With many more free hours in the day, many changed their habits to adapt to their new quarantine lifestyles. A number of people turned to home workouts during confinement: Fitness influencers such as Mrs. Sweendog have taken to posting daily workouts on their Instagram stories, and big brands such as Under Armour are hosting Zoom workouts. Instagram users are actively engaged in this healthy movement: according to Heuritech’s Instagram analysis, 1 out of 4 #covid19 posts relates to a healthy lifestyle during confinement. As a result, activewear experienced a boom among American consumers in particular.

Leggings are often in, and due to quarantine they are predicted to maintain a steady behavior for the next summer season according to Heuritech’s metrics. Similar to leggings, cycling shorts are also trending: this garment is the star item in this period of confinement. As summer approaches, the cycling short is forecasted to grow by 12% growth in the US.

But not everyone became an athlete in confinement — some chose this time to fully relax. Self-care such as meditation, yoga, or simply laying about, has given rise to loungewear. Consumers are looking for clothes that are practical & high quality, in soft, comfortable materials.

Particular pieces of clothing are trending as part of this healthy, self-care movement. For example, Net-a-Porter experienced a 40% growth in general sales of track pants during the first week of lockdown alone. As evidenced, the popularity of track pants is rising, and they appear to be the biggest fashion trend at the moment.

Oher classic comfort pieces are trending, as well. Sweatshorts, for example, are a new trend, perhaps due to the combination of warm, Spring weather and the desire for comfort whilst staying inside. Equally, sweatshirts are thriving in the US with a 9% growth compared to last summer, and while flat in Europe, they remain a reliable core product to collections. Sweatshorts and sweatshirts are popular in neutral colors, like greys or soft pastels.

Finally, people are craving cozy, fluffy fabrics and textures. Teddy textures, who are typically stronger in outerwear, are now cropping in different loungewear pieces during confinement, such as full sets. Ribbed knit is likewise expected to trend in the US this summer, often in pyjama-like pieces such as tank tops and pants. Velvet is another comfortable, soft fabric that has become a popular choice during confinement. According to Heuritech analysis, velvet will stay steady in Europe and grow by 13% in the US for Summer 2020, an interesting increase given that summer is typically its low season.

Europe and the US: Romantic minimalism defines during and post-pandemic fashion

Overlapping some aspects of sporty comfort, consumers in Europe and the US are carrying minimalist, romantic pieces from confinement right into Spring and Summer. This aesthetic reflects the caution many consumers in the West feel toward the post-Covid period, but more than this, it expresses a latent sense of hope: these vernal trends serve as a reminder that, like the Spring, life takes its course.

Pastels, a color quite reminiscent of Easter, will be popular in the coming months, most notably in pastel blue and duster pink. The refinement of these colors echoes soothing confinement activities such as meditation, but also Spring picnics once people are allowed out again.

Grey is equally a major trend, an interesting color choice for the sunny seasons of Spring and Summer, but a fitting color for the metaphorical “rainy days” consumers have been spending inside.

In the same category of neutral tones, post-confinement consumers will be wearing earth tones, which Heuritech already took note of earlier this year at FW20 Fashion Month. This summer in Europe, beige will see an 8% increase compared to last summer, the most popular pieces being tops and outerwear. Khaki will likewise increase as a trend compared to Summer 2019, with a 5% growth in Europe and 15% in the US. Outerwear and dresses will be the trendiest pieces to wear in khaki.

But beyond minimalist, neutral clothing, European and American consumers will also be wearing their excitement for Spring. Nothing says Spring like flowing and floral fabrics, and post-Covid is bound to be full of them.

Fittingly, floral maxi dresses are trending for the coming months, perfect for brunch mornings and leisurely outdoor afternoons. Ditsy dresses, though not exclusively floral print, will be trending for picnics in the park as people take advantage of green spaces in lieu of stores and restaurants. The ditsy print will increase by 21% this summer in Europe compared to last summer.

Evocative of a soft, feminine aesthetic, puff sleeves are in this summer. Consumers seem eager about the romantic Spring season by manifesting it through their clothing. This trend will be most popular on dresses, as well as on tops to give off vernal vibes. Finally, people won’t be letting of their comfortable, confinement clothing. Loose fits will be stylish, with flowing, supple fabrics on a variety of garments, from tops to trousers.

China: Optimism translates to the top post-Covid trends

While consumers in Europe and the US are transitioning their looks from confinement to freedom, those in China are already beginning to express post-Covid trends. Lockdown has been nearly fully lifted, and figures indicate the average Chinese consumer is eager to resume pre-pandemic consumption. The phenomenon has been coined as “revenge spending” as people return to stores and indulge in looks to show off in the streets after months in confinement. This optimism in Chinese consumers will be reflected through their top trends of Spring and Summer 2020.

It’s no secret that consumers spent significantly more time on social media during confinement than before, and as a result, they were more exposed to their favorite influencers than before. Often inspired by popular KOLs, the young Chinese consumer will be showing off big or repeated logos in the coming months. Nothing says brand pride more than obvious logos: popular aesthetics are big, bold text on garments.

Additionally, the summer trend of sequins evokes celebration, and what’s more worthy of being celebrated than the end of this pandemic? The trend will be most popular on dresses, perhaps for nights out after months in confinement.

Further reflecting the eagerness felt by so many Chinese consumers during this time, bright colors are sure to make a statement in the months to come. Many Chinese fashion designers such as Angel Chen and Christine Lau already play with lively colors, and it seems the trend will reach the mainstream as a result of this post-pandemic optimism with pop colors like yellow, red, and orange.

Other colors include fluorescents, and they will equally liven the streets in China this summer. Fluorescents in particular will be trending on jackets, pants, maxi dresses or even shoes: this is a strong trend for the months to come.

So what better than bold logos, dazzling sequins, and brilliant colors to translate a change of state of mind? The return of confidence and optimism in China will take the form of daring trends this summer, and looks will grace the streets and social media alike.

During and post-pandemic fashion

With its own methodology of social media analysis, Heuritech was able to predict this summer’s buzzing trends as the world comes out of confinement. Come summer, consumers will be wearing their hearts on their sleeves. Cautious yet hopeful American and European consumers have been getting fit and finding inner peace during confinement, so it’s no surprise that activewear and loungewear have been popular. Post-confinement, though, many of these consumers will transition sporty comfort into romantic minimalism, with soft, loose-fitting vernal garments to spend time with friends under the sun. Across the pond in China, consumers are nearly all out of confinement, and their clothes certainly won’t hide their excitement this summer. As an expression of post-confinement celebration, Chinese consumers will show off bold textures and colors on the streets in the coming months.

Fashion trends during and post-pandemic: What is and will be trending? was originally published in Heuritech, a Luxurynsight Company on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.

• Covid-19 has led fashion consumers to spend more time than ever on Instagram, with a 70% increase in traffic since the beginning of the pandemic.
• Despite confinement, consumers are still interested in fashion, with over a quarter of posts mentioning Covid-19 also relating to fashion in different ways.
• Consumers are buying less luxury items, getting more creative with what they already own, dressing more comfortably, and acting more eco-consciously in their purchasing habits.

Since the beginning of the pandemic, Instagram has experienced a 70% increase in traffic according to Facebook. Fashion brands as well as influencers have unsurprisingly upped their digital content and interaction with consumers on the platform to make use of this unprecedented, global quarantine. This bodes well for the average fashion consumer who, for the moment, cannot engage in traditional outside-of-the-home activities like window shopping or mall visits. As a result, Instagram has become more than ever a place where consumer expression runs honest and clear.

The rise of Covid-talk on Instagram

The buzzing topics on Instagram do a good job of documenting consumer sentiments along the course of Covid-19’s trajectory. Because the virus did not become widespread in Europe and the US until late February to early March, talk of the virus did not become widespread until around this time, either.

For example, since January at the first apparition of the hashtag, #coronavirus now stands at a total of 20 million posts according to the Instagram search. This is one of the fastest growths in popularity of a hashtag, indicating the relevance of the topic now still. Its popularity can also be explained by the boom in time spent on social media, and influencers are seeing increases in follower engagement.

Around the world, influencers, brands, and fashion publications are talking about Covid-19, and their content is growing more diverse and optimistic as the weeks in confinement go on. As such, #coronavirus has been slowly decreasing since its peak in March.

So how exactly have consumers managed to turn #coronavirus into something more positive, and at times more fashion-oriented?

How do consumers feel about fashion during Covid-19?

The first place to look is to fashion influencers. While some are now posting casual indoor looks, others are still getting dressed up or posting old outfit photos to entertain and inspire their followers. Luxury fashion products are a valuable indicator of influencers’ rapport with fashion at the moment, with the visibility of luxury products on social media down by 40%.

There is a clear drop in the number of luxury posts in March, largely due to the implementation of lockdown policies by countries. Around this same time, the number of posts featuring #quarantine skyrockets, marking the shift in focus from luxury content to perhaps more confinement-themed content.

Consumers at this moment in time seem to be more drawn to sweatpants than Chanel bags. What this means is that while consumer fashion preferences are shifting, they are not shifting away from fashion itself. Many have concerns about the economy and their incomes: for these reasons, times of crisis generally lead to reduced splurging from consumers. It’s only logical that luxury is temporarily stepping aside for more appropriate fashion trends, such as confinement-friendly loungewear and at-home exercise activewear.

Consumers are indeed maintaining an interest in fashion during Covid-19, albeit in creative new contexts. According to Heuritech’s Instagram analysis, over a quarter of posts are related to fashion in different ways: to promote an outfit, to share fashion projects, to show off one’s quarantine look, or to experiment with DIYs. Instagram influencers Camille Hurel and Estelle Chen, for example, have popularized #FashionWeekQuarantine to encourage their followers and fellow fashion lovers to show off their favorite looks, and even to donate to French hospitals.

So while many consumers are experiencing feelings of uncertainty, fashion is providing an escape from reality in a way that is creative and social online. Confinement, interestingly enough, has brought consumers to express hope for the industry’s future through creativity and new fashion trends.

Additionally, consumers seem to be becoming more eco-conscious in their fashion habits. Instagram movements like the previously-mentioned DIYs, as well as the hashtag #wearyourwardrobe, are snapshots of this change in consumer attitudes. Covid-19 may be the watershed moment for sustainable fashion: according to Heuritech data, #sustainable has grown 5 times on Instagram in the last 3 years.

After years of activists raising awareness, it seems Covid-19 has ignited the spark, exposing the weaknesses of the industry and leading the average consumer to engage more with the planet through fashion. Consumers during this confinement are giving more attention to smaller, independent designers, buying less, and purchasing sustainably- made clothing. Thanks to consumers becoming more willing to make sacrifices for sustainable fashion, the post-Covid industry could literally mean greener pastures.

Buzzing hashtags on Instagram

In order to track the evolution of topics overlapping Covid-19 and fashion, Heuritech followed the most popular hashtags starting in January 2020. In the last few weeks in particular, the evolution in popularity of certain hashtags related to confinement has been growing at a very fast pace. For example, the number of posts with the hashtag #coronavid19 grew by 81% compared to the period before March 25th, which seems to have become a new way to talk about the virus. Other hashtags including #quarantinelife and #stayhomestaysafe reflect the primary position confinement is currently occupying in the minds of many consumers.

In order to rank hashtags which overlap the topics of Covid-19 and fashion, Heuritech quantified their popularity in volume, meaning their presence on Instagram among the posts analyzed. For example, according Heuritech data, #stayhome had the biggest presence on Instagram with 3.4% of posts, followed by #quarantine.

Topics relating to confinement such as #stayhome or #staysafe are widely used by consumers to demonstrate their involvement in fighting the spread of the virus. But influencers are often the ones pushing the narrative first: for example, popular fashion influencer @fabialamode is participating in the hashtag #ObviouslyforGood, a movement which emphasizes the importance of self-isolation during this time. Her followers are encouraged to follow advice from sources like the World Health Organization, as well as to donate to the front lines of Covid-19.

In this moment of uncertainty, the return to oneself seems to have once again become a common instinct. Indoor exercise has gone virtual to occupy the confined consumer. As a result, exercise-related hashtags are standing out, and 1 out of 4 posts related to Covid-19 refer to a healthy lifestyle in some way.

More zen activities such as yoga and meditation are growing in popularity as well, serving to reflect the sense of peace and control many consumers are hanging onto during this time. There have been 3 times more mentions of meditation since the beginning of quarantine, and #yoga ranks even above #covid_19 at the moment.

These attitudes translate into a feed of content displaying healthy activities, with users and influencers sharing their at-home activities. As such, direct influencer-to-consumer content has increased during confinement, as influencers like NYC-based Hanna Coleman are posting their home work-out routines, with the most popular ones even seeing a significant boost in engagement right now.

But social media can also serve for entertainment only, with the popular trend of nostalgic pictures accompanied by the hashtag #TBT, or Throwback Thursday. With the Met Gala having been canceled this year, for example, celebrities and everyday consumers alike went to Instagram to post their throwbacks and their would-be Met Gala outfits.

Covid’s lasting impact on consumer attitudes

Covid-19 has already changed consumer attitudes in a matter of months. Within the context of fashion in particular, it seems perspectives are shifting to accommodate the palpable disruption in the industry. People are demanding more intimate relationships with their favorite brands and influencers: on Instagram, popular movements include solidarity campaigns to help frontline workers, hashtags which promote creative, eco-conscious fashion trends, and at-home workouts to stay healthy during quarantine.

Indeed, #coronavirus and its many cousins have become a way to wield positivity for many fashion consumers and influencers. By analyzing Instagram in the context of Covid-19, Heuritech was able to gauge both the evolution and subcategories of consumer attitudes in the context of Covid-19 and fashion. The impacts of the pandemic will continue to be felt as time progresses, and the best thing fashion players can do is keep alert to the ebb and flow of their many loyal consumers.

Consumer attitudes: Covid-19 x Fashion was originally published in Heuritech, a Luxurynsight Company on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.