Slightly older article -- Fashion's latest fixation: 3D
Tue Feb 23, 1:44 PM ET
A model wears an outfit by designers Burberry Prorsum for their Autumn/Winter 2010 collection at London Fashion Week, in London, Tuesday, Feb. 23, 2010.
(AP Photo/Alastair Grant)Fashion's latest fixation: 3D
Burberry has become the premiere brand to break through fashion week's fourth wall this season by staging the world's first-ever global 3D fashion show. (To note, the British fashion brand wasn't the only one to engage with the technology conceived more than half-a-century ago: Los Angeles tailored menswear label Native Son's New York Fashion Week presentation included a multi-dimensional video that required 3D glasses for viewing.)
Burberry creative director Christopher Bailey's (since heralded) show took place Tuesday in London and was simultaneously aired in five major fashion capitals around the globe. A smattering of editors and fashion cognoscenti were invited to the exclusive screenings with the requirement that they don the same wayfarer-esque black rims millions of theater goers slipped on to watch any number of 3D films this past year. Soon after, a parade of digitally projected models in thigh-high crocodile boots and sumptuous leather aviator jackets walked past. And, rest assured, they won't be the last.
On Thursday news surfaced that Fendi, an Italian fashion house overseen by the inimitable Karl Lagerfeld, was shooting its Paris presentation in 3D for potential use in its storefronts, as well as for special events. But, while all signs point to fashion going to the third dimension, just how much longevity can such a novelty maintain in a notoriously fickle industry? Like anything new in a world where movements are branded and capitalized on faster than you can say "next please," the push for 3D is likely to experience a shelf-life exponentially shorter than its past comebacks in popular culture.
There's a strong potential that the next few seasons of fashion shows will feature newly famous fashion bloggers and editors toting 3D glasses in their designer bags alongside their iPad. But, as Google Wave has learned the hard way, the question with new technology remains: is it making our lives better, easier, more convenient? In this case, not really. Like that one accessory Coco Chanel famously recommended women take off before leaving the house, 3D may be just one more thing we don't need.
So, in all likelihood, expect that fashion's 3D fixation will go the way of recently resurrected (and shortly thereafter laid to rest) styles like acid wash and harem pants. In ten years we'll all look back and laugh at how funny we looked, decked out in our best designer duds, watching the latest sartorial creations parade before us in goofy glasses when we could have just as easily watched it live (thanks to the new, more practical norm of live-streaming shows on the web) from the comfort of one's own home.
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