Balenciaga’s video-game: fashion of Fall 21
Balenciaga showcased its Fall 2021 collection via a much-awaited video game, titled, Afterworld: The Age of Tomorrow. Set in a post-apocalyptic world, check all about this talk-of-the-town collab between fashion and the virtual world.
Balenciaga’s Creative Director Demna Gvasalia told WWD he sees clothes as “modern-day armour”. “It completes our personal identities and shows us in the way we want to be visually perceived by the world around us. So, in a way, the way we dress does play a role in our self-protection,” Gvasalia reiterated his point in another interview with Vogue.
The manifestation of his thoughts can be seen very clearly in Balenciaga’s Fall 2021 collection which featured medieval-styled armour boots and even a full-body armour. Although, the breakthrough was the way Balenciaga gave meaning and medium to its fashion world in its newest collection. The French fashion house presented the collection via a much-awaited video game titled, Afterworld: The Age of Tomorrow, which one can play through the company’s site.
The game’s backdrop is of 2031, presenting a dystopian world reaching for a utopian one. Surreal at times though, the gameplay’s optimistic message goes well with the current real-world situation. Even while experimenting with a virtual medium, the positioning of fashion never seems out of place with clothes rendered so-well, you might as well think they are there for real.
A player needs to walk through different stages, including apocalyptic-looking streets and mystical forests to finally retrieve the Sword of Excalibur aka the sword in stone. As per Balenciaga, it is the idea that a distressed world can achieve a healthier balance of nature and industry is that they have tried to capture in this game.
Not just the game, Fall 2021’s Balenciaga Lookbook is experimental too with each style presented as an avatar. You can pick and rotate them 360 degrees to see the components of each style in detail. The label put forth a new format without losing sight of what they are representing, i.e, fashion.
It is early to say that Balenciaga’s Afterworld is a perfect blend of fashion and video games, given an absence of any sort of challenge in the “video game” and the game ultimately culminating with a breathing exercise. But it is a start and a bold one, for a luxury label to emerge out of the seemingly endless cycle of seasons and ramp walks and to venture into the territory of virtual reality.