French fashion house offers immersive experience in new digital showroom

Balmain is offering customers an immersive and futuristic experience with a virtual showroom that will house its upcoming cruise collection

Spotted: The French fashion house, Balmain, is now offering customers an immersive and futuristic experience, with a digital showroom which will unveil its upcoming cruise collection. The showroom features virtual muses and giant projectors, with a 3D avatar of Olivier Rousteing, the brand’s artistic director, acting as a host and guide for customers during their shopping experience.

The exterior of the virtual showroom is a digitised version of Balmain’s iconic Paris flagship store at 44 rue François-1e, onto which customers have to click to enter. Once in the showroom, customers can browse the collection in a 360° view and discover the storytelling behind it. Rousteing’s goal for the showroom was to reveal the human contact behind the collection, mixing virtual frames with footage of the tailors that had put in all the hard work to complete the garment in time.  

This journey into cyber reality seems like a natural progression for Rousteing, as he has been an exuberant presence on social media during the COVID-19 lockdown. He is bringing his playful and personal approach to Balmain in the same way that he has kept his followers entertained with dance routines, work and sketches, and even by being one of the first designers to join the TikTok community.

Explore more: Fashion & Beauty Innovations | COVID-19 Innovations