InvestigationA life to be staged on social networks, with a branded jacket or bag … If influencers are sometimes laughed at, fashion can no longer do without them. With their millions of subscribers on TikTok and Instagram, they have become essential communication relays, the effectiveness of which is immediately measured thanks to digital tools.
It was fine in Venice on July 14th. Fashion revived with a certain sweetness of life, a semblance of “Life before”. In recent months, physical events, parades and cocktails, have been resuming here and there. For its spring-summer 2022 men’s collection, the Saint Laurent house had invited journalists and fashion editors, personalities (actress and singer Charlotte Gainsbourg, Cesarized actor Dylan Robert, models Anja Rubik, to the city of the Doges, Hailey Bieber and Mica Argañaraz…) and influencers (tiktokers with millions of subscribers such as Jaden Hossler, Leo Reilly, Dylan Snyder or Jackson Passaglia, mostly from Los Angeles).
On the island of La Certosa, the mirror installation created by the American plastic artist Doug Aitken in collaboration with Anthony Vaccarello, the artistic director of Saint Laurent, hosted the show, while reflecting the vegetation, the lagoon and the pastel sky.
Once night fell, shuttles took the press on board for dinner on the rooftop of Danieli, the legendary Venetian hotel. It is there, between the risotto with prawns and the dessert, that the editors-in-chief, stylists and reporters learned that a good part of their neighbors of parade seats were dining at the same time around Anthony Vaccarello.
The explosion of boxes in the luxury industry
Actor Fionn O’Shea, singer Eddie Benjamin and all kinds of people with impeccable physique and age inversely proportional to their number of followers on social networks would participate in the wake of a privileged evening. By discovering the “stories” (ephemeral images and videos posted on Instagram) of these happy few, journalists were moved.
The affront felt by the installed press may make you smile, but the episode reflects the explosion of boxes in the luxury industry. The shock arose less from a difference in treatment (very comfortable for all, moreover) between the guests, than from the conclusion that had to be drawn: in this context, the most effective media were not embodied by the journalists but by influencers. Until yesterday, editors, stylists, critics who worked for magazines and newspapers were the favorite children, invited everywhere, courted. Today they must learn to share.
If @xeniaadonts (1.8 million Instagram subscribers) weighs in from Hamburg and @brunamarquezine (40.8 million) from Brazil, in France, a dozen accounts are regularly cited by representatives of fashion houses or offices of press: @ camillecharrière, @leiasfez, @louloudesaison, @slipintostyle, @ndjolijean, @jaimetoutcheztoi, @lifeofboheme, @ thedailydeb…
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