Fashion AI's digital design competition, inspired by Plato’s Atlantis

Imagine a world where unsustainable fashion is a concept of the past. Even more intriguing, envision entering an aquatic metaverse where you can witness upcoming and exciting oceanic and sustainable fashion from digital designers, dedicated to changing the fashion industry for the better.

Fashion AI, whose professional ethos consistently evolves within the ideals of the circular economy, is making this dream a reality. Inspired by Alexander McQueen’s 2010 ‘Plato’s Atlantis’ fashion show, digital creators, graphic designers and fashionistas of all realms are invited to enter this environmentally friendly, digital competition. Participants will be called to submit Atlantis inspired designs which will become part of a fashion show taking place in an underwater metaverse.

McQueen’s 2010 collection was created to convey our biomorphic relationship to our environment, with garments displaying hybridisation of human and animal forms. These clothing designs echoed a certain harmony with nature and inspired future designers to guide the fashion industry towards sustainability and environmental causes.

Much like Fashion AI’s upcoming digital fashion competition, McQueen’s original show envisaged a better future and a call to action over pressing environmental issues. Fashion AI’s Atlantis show hopes to join this voice, reminding audiences to think about what we do to help the planet on a personal and social level. It seeks to promote discussion around how far we have to go until there is a higher level of consonance between commercial industries, and the protection of our natural world.

What can we expect?

The aim of this inclusive, all digital, all sustainable competition is to highlight our impact on oceans, and most importantly, how fast fashion is such a large contributor to this damage.

Picture amphibian design, mermaid tails, shimmering scales, webbed fins, tentacles, translucence, luminescence and glimmering eyes that can peer straight through the murky depths. Perhaps even the rustic elegance of the mythological city of Atlantis will inspire creators entering the competition. Or maybe the bold mix of colour we only see from the creatures and plant-life that reside within the cool tones of the deep.

This digital fashion experience will be a chance for designers to incorporate elements of the environmental messages which are most important to them, with the enchantment and mysticism of the sea. A unique chance to experiment with the digital textures and materials that are most congruent with their ideals.

On entering the underwater world, users will be met with pulsating surroundings made up of sea creatures and thalassic organic textures and shapes. A living, breathing environment, reminding us that our oceans are very much alive, and that our friends in the sea are at the forefront of this creation.

Users will initially find themselves in a space replicating the ocean’s depths. As the surrounding landscape looms and rises, the digital waves will heighten, reflecting the man-made challenges of climate change which affect our own rising sea levels. The space will open up so that visitors are contained within motions reminiscent of the sea. A protective aquatic film will shield them from the water, and the water from humanity. Poseidon had a similar idea as he built Atlantis in order to protect his mortal love, Cleito. In this moment we are not only reminded to respect the sea, but that the sea requires protection from us.

The City of Atlantis; A muse for change

The magical essence of the lost city of Atlantis encapsulates so many hidden messages about our relationship to the environment and ocean life. Our oceans, over 80% of which are unexplored, are in many ways as mysterious and alien to us as the legendary city itself. According to Plato, this utopian kingdom existed around 9000 years before his time, inexplicably disappearing one day. A fate that sustainable digital fashion hopes to do it’s part in preventing, as our beautiful seas continue to be threatened by microplastics, waste and human consumption. It was a place known to hold all the pleasures of the world but was said to have sunk to the bottom of the sea after an unknown natural disaster. A warning perhaps of what may happen if we do not hold sustainability at the focus of our industrial production.

Just like the underwater world created by designer Maya Kaaki, the lost city’s land was surrounded by rings of water, connected to the ocean through five tunnels. Fashion AI’s digital experience will take you down a runway leading to five different areas, reflecting the topography of ancient Atlantis. Within these sections it will be possible to view and buy different competitor designs of apparel, shoes and accessories.

The combined pathway and runway through the aquatic fashion displays will use warm red, pink and coral geometric hues, not unlike the red bricks of Atlantis, to guide you through the contrasting cool tones of the design filled spaces. Think calming blues, greys and greens.

Maya Kaaki has encompassed the importance of our relationship to the health of our oceans within her creation, taking warm blooded mammals on a journey through the home of our cooler ocean dwelling friends. The perfect environment is provided to highlight our differences and similarities to life under the sea, and the way in which we invade this precious, ethereal ecosystem with our consumerism and greed.

This surrealistic experience aligns beautifully with digital fashion’s mission to eliminate fast fashion whilst creating an environment of inclusivity of body shape and gender. And no matter who you are, you can explore this fashion show and retail space. Just as no matter who you are you can be a part of wearing digital fashion. The path to each underwater segment of Maya’s design reflects this, providing a social space and runway. This runway is not just for catwalk models or limited to high fashion audiences, but is for every consumer and user to exist in.

Clothes will be displayed on translucent avatars, an essence of jellyfish in human-like form, circulating natural electricity and expressing McQueen’s interest in morphing beings. In keeping with the theme, these mannequin avatars will allow designs to be the visual focus of the experience.

Digital fashion, will it catch on?

Digital fashion is an intangible premise which may still be a little alien to some, but an exciting and reassuring premise to those aware of the sustainable possibilities of this conceptual shift. A 2019 study showed us that 1 in 3 women consider an outfit to be old after a couple of wears, many believing it a faux pas to be photographed wearing the same outfit twice.

It seems that the times of having staples in our wardrobe to mix and match, caring lovingly for our clothes and relishing the occasions when we can wear our favourite pieces, are becoming something of the past.

All hope is not lost though. For all the issues that fast fashion presents us with, there are people who really care not only about their clothes, but the planet too.

Fast fashion produces over 92 million tonnes of waste per year, with many clothing brands destroying clothes instead of re-selling, simply because it is cheaper to do so. Scarier still, up to 100 billion new items are made each year across the fashion industry and those working in fast fashion are often subject to severe labour abuses.

Cotton is one of the most water intensive crops, billions of microplastics end up in the sea and the carbon footprint from the fashion industry contributes over 8% of global climate impacts. This means it creates more greenhouse gas emissions than all international flights.

Digital fashion may be new, but it has its feet firmly planted in the fashion world already. In 2018, Scandinavian retailer Carlings launched the first ever digital-only clothing collection varying from below £10 to over £300. With many items costing around £15 the retailer aimed to create accessible fashion by making prices inclusive. A team of digital designers would edit the outfit to fit a photo of the customer.

This collection was so popular that in 2019 they released an augmented reality T shirt which allowed the wearer to change the shirt’s design using Spark AR technology, their smartphone and custom social media filters. Not only is this a great deal for those buying, but also a win for sustainability. Dozens of digital designs at a low cost and brilliantly sustainable.

If you need more convincing that digital fashion is the next big thing, in 2019, fashion giant Louis Vuitton entered into a partnership with League of Legends, designing a series of skins for the popular online battle arena video game. Digital fashion in the form of skins, outfits and accessories has been around in the gaming world for a long time, growing with their ever improving and now incredibly impressive and realistic graphics. Buying fashion for gaming avatars is an industry predicted to reach $50 billion by the end of this year.

2019 also saw a couture dress selling for $9,500, created by digital fashion house, The Fabricant. Although this may be a high price when we think of providing fashion for all, we can definitely see this is a positive step forward for digital fashion, showing it to be not only a trend of the masses, but the future of high fashion as well.

It may seem like a far detached idea. But as our socialisation, enjoyment, gaming, work, shared interests and communications are transferred more and more each day into our online worlds, the span of the metaverse in all these areas and now fashion, is a fast approaching probability.

Despite the ever popular and convenient option of online shopping, digital fashion has even reached our highstreets. HOT:SECOND, a pop-up store in London, veered down the sustainability route guided by ideals of the circular economy and sustainability. Visitors could exchange a real piece of clothing which they wished to donate and in return try on and photograph themselves in a range of different digital garments in different styles.

There are more sure-fire signs in the fashion world particularly, which show us that we are entering a new era of how we approach and interact with clothing. As well as fulfilling a desperate need for sustainability in the social media era, where clothes are used predominantly just to feature in photographs.

These clothes can fulfil our everyday desires as well as fashion fantasies.
Digital fashion is inclusive for all genders and sizes.
It can help prevent the current rate of around 60% of clothes ending up in landfill within the first year of being made.
Creating a digital item leaves 95% less of a carbon footprint than the average physical garment, if we consider waste generated in the designing and sampling of physical clothing.
Digital fashion is an environmentally friendly route, even for physical products. PUMA teamed up with The Fabricant to create a digital design proof which got rid of the need for handling, sampling and travelling. Time and market costs were also down 30% and water usage decreased by 17.4%.
It creates more scope for self expression than the outdoor wear we might usually buy.
Clothes can be created in a quicker timespan, as selling 100 of the same item means only having to create one of that item.
The technology exists to fit outfits to avatars and photographs and soon we will be able to create live videos, wearing a digital outfit, or multiple outfits if we so choose.
Digital fashion is the best upcoming solution to fast fashion and its impacts on the environment.

Changing the meaning of fast fashion

Fashion AI has created this design opportunity and experience using the ethos that fast fashion can mean something different. That creation can be quick, that our move away from poor worker conditions and harming our environments can become a thing of the present, and that our outfit changes, as technology is improved, can be speedier than ever before. Imagine a world where you see clothes on yourselves before making or buying them, where fast fashion waste is dramatically decreased and one shot instagram outfits are not destroyed soon after they are made. Together we can help create this reality.

We are in an era that is calling out for a change in consumer patterns as we face the realisation that we are the main cause of climate change. Digital fashion is the ideal platform to launch from, and Fashion AI’s digital competition and arena is an exciting part of our great journey together towards sustainability and raising awareness for our environment.

We can’t wait to see the submissions. Perhaps they will engage us with their underwater materials, their environmental messages, or their otherworldly designs representing the mysteries of the seas and the city of Atlantis. A place which some still believe lies somewhere at the bottom of the depths. Maybe they will wow us with a bit of everything. We’ll see you there.