Welcome back to Runway, where we report to you from the frontlines of the digital fashion revolution. In the beautiful chaos of trying to keep up with all things digital fashion and luxury, we missed a few important announcements, like model Karlie Kloss revealing her newest initiative on Roblox and Diesel leaning into music NFTs (signal Cooper Turley, a huge advocate of music in web3 whispering “Music NFTs” as he reads this snippet). Beyond that, we have some significant news from House of Web3, a look at the Levi’s backlash, and more.
House of Web3
House of Web3 is minting its membership token on March 31. House of Web3 designs, produces, markets, and distributes physical and digital products with ongoing utility at scale. With a design studio and physical manufacturing plant, the team works with big and small retailers alike, including Fred Segal, Moda Operandi, Saks Fifth Avenue, and Sotheby’s Auction House. It’s also the first retail platform to be fractionally owned by its community.
The pass, issued as an NFT, allows holders access to in-house manufacturing capabilities, promotion and sale on HW3.io, access to workshops, industry insights and consumer trends reports, and fixed token rewards from community-driven projects. Those who mint will be in good company; other token holders and founding members of House of Web2 include Avery Akkineni (VaynerX), Megan Kaspar (Red DAO), Brit Morin (BFF), and Swan Sit.
Getting Klossy
In Karlie Kloss’s newest fashion destination on Roblox, aptly named Fashion Klossette, visitors are transported into a stunning two-story building reminiscent of the legendary Paris fashion show venue, the Grand Palais. Fashion takes center stage as players create and style their own looks, vying to climb the fashion ranks from intern to editor-in-chief by garnering upvotes from their peers. The game has proven to be an instant hit, attracting seven million visits in its first week.
Klosette’s styling studio is a first-of-its-kind on the platform, allowing people to customize the color and texture of individual items and layer different makeup looks. Past iterations of worlds on Roblox initially featured simplistic boxy characters with limited customization options.
Levi’s Jeans gets into AI
Levi Strauss & Co., the iconic legacy brand responsible for Levi’s Jeans, announced a landmark partnership with Lalaland.ai on March 22 to test its customized, AI-generated models. Established in Amsterdam in 2019, Lalaland.ai has developed groundbreaking machine learning technology that allows fashion brands and retailers to generate hyper-realistic models of all body types, ages, sizes, and skin tones.
The company’s inclusive avatars have been designed to reshape the fashion industry’s approach to diversity, sustainability, and inclusiveness for customers, brands, and retailers alike. However, Levi’s is already facing backlash, as some say replacing diverse human models with diverse AI models feels like a step backward.
Levi’s responded in a statement saying, “we are not scaling back our plans for live photo shoots, the use of live models, or our commitment to working with diverse models. Lalaland.ai’s technology, and AI more broadly, can potentially assist us by allowing us to publish more images of our products on a range of body types more quickly.”
Diesel and Public Pressure
Diesel, in partnership with Web3 media company Public Pressure, unveiled their first commercial campaign of a “Discovery” series with a drop featuring a downloadable audio track from artist, HoneyLuv accompanied by exclusive artwork created by visual designer Nic Paranoia. The first release sold out within four hours, with over 1,200 tracks minted, generating almost $50,000 in revenue.
