RTFKT Studios wants to be the 'Supreme' of the digital world, and we are all for it.
There's a tiny little company out the fashion world. A #streetwear brand that started out as anti-establishment. It ruled the streets of New York in the early 90's and their brand warriors were shredding the rails way before Lupe Fiasco ever rapped about it. They started their own publication, highlighting what they thought was cool. It's a brand we think is pretty cool, no matter what other #hypebeast or keyboard warriors want you think. It's a streetwear fashion brand that has collaborated with companies completely out of left field that you wouldn't have guessed in a gazillion years would work together. But they did, and in turn, transformed them into bonafide rock stars just by riding the coattails of said streetwear brand. You might have heard of this teeny company – they're called Supreme?
So let me get this straight, Supreme can collaborate with the likes of Yeti, Louis Vuitton NBA2k, and no one has ever thought to become the digital version? The short answer is no. Not until now, that is. Well, let us introduce you to RTFKT Studios and hell yes, they want to be the 'Supreme' of the #metaverse.
We've heard the stories already. In fact, you've probably heard us yelling on the rooftops about how the #Gaming universe is being taken over by brands to reach an entirely untapped audience. People of all ages are gaming on their phones, consoles, computers and even their goddamn tv's. It's everywhere.
Now we've gotten to the point where dressing your in-game character has become almost important as dressing in real life. No longer are we worrying about the shoe rotation in the real world, we're also looking at how fly we're looking in #Fortnite, #OverwatchLeague or #NBA2K22. Your digital life, like in Ready Player One, has become a second identity and is important as Batman is to Bruce Wayne. Two sides of the same coin.
This is where RTFKT Studios comes in. Through AR/VR, they want to create highly limited edition apparel drops, much like what we see with Supreme, by allowing people to simply try on apparel. But we think this is much cooler. Why? In the real world, you're somewhat limited by the physical materials you have at your disposal. You can't necessarily manufacture a sneaker from let's say, crocodile hides sewn together with LED screens (or who knows, maybe you can, fashion is crazy nowadays). But in the digital world, you can with the utterly outrageous. When you start with a digital sneaker, you have an infinite number of possibilities. Rocket boosters? No problem. LED screens in the shape of a Nike swoosh? You got it. You can have more fun bringing a digital creation into the real world as opposed to bringing a limited physical creation into the digital world. In our opinion, at least.
RTFKT has done this recently in a collab with StockX. Called the "Fewocious RTFKT" in different variations, these bad boys were created in digital form first, and then were physically fabricated.
It's no coincidence then, that we've seen an uptick in major brands attempting to cross over into this fertile, digital territory. Not only can you test to see if you look fly in a 3D puffy jacket or sweet pair of shoes, but why wouldn't a brand want to tap into doing virtual collabs? If Ninja, the most famous gamer in the world, can bring in 16 million viewers to watch him play games, you bet your ass RipNDip is going to want to collaborate with Fortnite on some limited edition drop or Glossier is going to work with Overwatch League so your player gets an exclusive strawberry plum shade of lipstick on their avatar. At the very least, let's try on some dope-looking sneakers in the AR/VR world before thinking about adding them to the shoe rotation.
Until next time friends.