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Perspectives on the Evolution of Digital Identity
LETTER FROM THE EDITORIAL TEAM
THE WORLD HAS NEVER FELT MORE LIMITLESS
We traverse the digital and physical worlds, often at the ease of a swipe and with it, our identities morph to imagine who we can, or who we want to be. As we catapult towards the future, there’s no such thing as offline– boundaries are breaking between the past, present, future and a beyond we may not even know yet. Innovation has always stood for the dismantling of societal norms by radical free thought and our phygital selves are no exception, but that was not always the case…
Centuries ago, our ancestors adorned their faces and bodies, weaving a vibrant narrative of cultural
significance and personal identity. Writer, Emilia Petrarca, insightfully reminds us that these ancient
practices of self-expression—through piercings, body art, and more—served as profound declarations of
identity long before the digital dawn. Yet, today, these traditions are reimagined within the virtual
sphere, challenging us to reassess their impact and significance in our contemporary narrative.
In the present, we find ourselves entangled in a complex web of digital identities. Editor and writer, Alex
Peters, introduces us to the concept and evolution of avatars, transforming from divine and royal
representations (as statues) into diverse digital personas accessible to all. This shift to an increasingly
democratic digital presence marks a new era of self-expression, where augmented and virtual realities offer
us unparalleled autonomy over our digital guise. Yet, amidst this expansive algorithmic domain, we are
invited to delve into deeper contemplations of identity, representation, and the delicate dance between our
physical selves and our digital embodiments.
Echoing this sentiment, fashion critic Ryan Yip and trend forecaster Agus Panzoni explore the influence of
social media on fashion and identity, illustrating how our digital selves are shaped by the rapid production
and consumption of “content.” They shed light on the cyclical nature of trends and the quest for
individuality in an era where personal style can be a form of resistance. Their insights call us to question
the authenticity of our digital expressions and the true essence of self-expression in the age of algorithms
and fleeting “-cores.”
Amidst this backdrop, the conversation between interdisciplinary artists Helena Dong and Nigel Matambo
illuminates the way forward, demonstrating the transformative power of digital fashion and technology. Their
pioneering spirit encourages us to view these digital frontiers as a collective canvas for innovation, where
technology is not merely a spectacle but a tool for crafting unique spaces for authenticity and community in
the future.
The Studio.Halia is here with you. Steering through the flux with intention and creativity, let us grasp the
reins of our digital identities and foster a future where every click, post, and pixel echoes our collective
humanity and imagination.
EDITORIAL
Guest Editor
Lynette NylanderART DIRECTOR
Georgia CanningFuture
DO IT FOR THE PLOT
By Agus Panzoni
Consciously or subconsciously– that has become the ethos of our current times. As we witness global narratives collapse—supercharged by the relentless 'permacrisis'—personal mythos has become the ground on which we can confidently stand; it is the reality we can author.
Against this backdrop, fashion and beauty have become tools for us to craft our autofiction. The continuous categorization and recategorization of these under the guise of ‘trends,’ has allowed us to assign narrative value to products and styles, which we can temporarily adopt for the plot, of course.
As Shumon Basar put it, we're living in the era of LoreCore: 'a prevalent stage of reality in which we're all characters; characters who are also audiences.' From Coquette to Mermaid fashion, from Doe to Siren Eyes, codified styles are 'guiding' our characters' journey, while optimizing it for digital consumption.
Anyone online can make themselves an author in the era of LoreCore, packaging language, symbols and loose ideologies into visual identities to be used in our self-storification. “It’s a rat girl’s summer” claims someone in a viral video, engraving the rat girl commandments of ‘spending time outside, freely snacking, killing the cringe and no overthinking’ on a notes app page. Months later, rat girls are bringing their irreverent spontaneity to a Heaven by Marc Jacobs photo campaign.
As we spend more time in digital spaces, algorithms accelerate the recognition and spread of identity markers, giving people agency to draft and share their own narratives under an aestheticized banner. But do these have any real bearing on IRL culture or is that also a myth?
We have character and we have audiences, but where are the communities?
Makeup and face embellishments have long served as a medium for expressing the identity and values of subcultures, visually delineating a group's boundaries and conveying its ideologies, resistance, and solidarity. While algorithms excel at bringing micro-communities to light, they often distill and fetishize these groups' unique visual codes, priming them for the digestion of the lowest common denominator.
Dollcore, originating from Japan, once involved 'Dolling,' where people used BJD Kigurumi masks to transform themselves into living dolls. While Dollcore has gained recent popularity in the West, it has been simplified to heavy blush and lower lash mascara. Indeed, Dollcore’s roots in Japanese culture was lost in translation as their visual markers were homogenized to appeal to the masses. Algorithmic discovery is reshaping our beauty tastes and preferences, driving them towards niche interests while simultaneously fostering homogeneity.
Consciousness vs subconsciousness–that has become the ethos of our current times. As we witness global narratives collapse—supercharged by the relentless 'permacrisis'—personal mythos has become the ground on which we can confidently stand; it is the reality we can author.
Against this backdrop, fashion and beauty have become tools for us to craft our autofiction. The continuous categorization and recategorization of these under the guise of ‘trends,’ has allowed us to assign narrative value to products and styles, which we can temporarily adopt for the plot, of course.
As Shumon Basar put it, we're living in the era of “LoreCore”: 'a prevalent stage of reality in which we're all characters; characters who are also audiences.' From Coquette to Mermaid fashion, from Doe to Siren Eyes, codified styles are 'guiding' our characters' journeys, while optimizing it for digital consumption.
Anyone online can make themselves an author in the era of LoreCore, packaging language, symbols, and loose ideologies into visual identities to be used in our self-storification. “It’s a rat girl’s summer” claims someone in a viral video, engraving the rat girl commandments of “spending time outside, freely snacking, killing the cringe and no overthinking” on a notes app page. Months later, rat girls are bringing their irreverent spontaneity to a Heaven by Marc Jacobs photo campaign.
As we spend more time in digital spaces, algorithms accelerate the recognition and spread of identity markers, giving people agency to draft and share their own narratives under an aestheticized banner. But do these have any real bearing on IRL culture or is that also a myth?
We have character and we have audiences, but where are the communities?
Makeup and face embellishments have long served as a medium for expressing the identity and values of subcultures, visually delineating a group's boundaries and conveying its ideologies, resistance, and solidarity. While algorithms excel at bringing micro-communities to light, they often distill and fetishize these groups' unique visual codes, priming them for the digestion of the lowest common denominator.
Dollcore, originating from Japan, once involved 'Dolling,' where people used BJD Kigurumi masks to transform themselves into living dolls. While Dollcore has gained recent popularity in the West, it has been simplified to heavy blush and lower lash mascara.
Indeed, Dollcore’s roots in Japanese culture were lost in translation as their visual markers were homogenized to appeal to the masses. Algorithmic discovery is reshaping our beauty tastes and preferences, driving them towards niche interests while simultaneously fostering homogeneity.
“The girls who get it, get it, and those who don’t, don’t spend enough time online.”
The speed of algorithms both fosters and hinders niche beauty, pushing us towards new narratives before the previous ones can fully integrate into the social fabric. The lack of prolonged cultural buy-in doesn’t tie aesthetics to specific people and places, allowing the rise of identity markers that exist exclusively online. In this context, AR Filters serve as a waste-less pathway of beauty storytelling with real-world influence.
waste-less pathway of beauty storytelling
This was illustrated by the explosive popularity of Pat McGrath's Porcelain Skin look from the
Margiela FW24 runway. The look utilizes a thin layer of a cucumber mask to mimic the supernaturally lustrous
finish of AR filters. While narratively adjacent to the Dollettes, the practical requirement for constant
water reapplication to maintain the cucumber mask's moisture—and to prevent it from cracking—renders Pat
McGrath’s Porcelain look impractical for real-world use.
The rise of digitally-driven cultural narratives and advancements in technology is bringing about the dawn
of phygital beauty, an era in which beauty storytelling through makeup and face embellishments reach beyond
their physical capabilities. Emerging brands are making strides in this space. The Unseen is creating
eyeshadows that change color with your camera’s flash, while Shu Uemura’s 3D Stickers unlock a realm
of exclusive augmented reality content when viewed through an iPhone camera. This could be taken to new
heights with the Apple Vision Pro world, where digital-native brands and creators will be able to create
physical objects that unlock digital experiences and content. Therefore, phygital beauty has the potential
to anchor digital storytelling into the physical world.
From the earliest days of civilization, storytelling has been crucial in building connections and
communities. Stories unite people through shared experiences, fostering a sense of belonging. By removing
digital storytelling from the context of algorithms, phygital beauty has the potential to reinvigorate
community spirit. In this light, phygital beauty becomes a medium for communal identity and collective
expression, with brands facilitating new forms of social interaction and community building.
Yet, the core of storytelling and community lies in its openness and free access. In an era dominated by
performance and consumption, we are reminded that the most impactful stories are those shared freely.
Although phygital beauty opens up new avenues for community engagement, its success in creating real
connections will depend on our dedication to keeping these stories free from the constraints of performance
metrics and consumption imperatives.
The speed of algorithms both fosters and hinders niche beauty, pushing us towards new narratives before the previous ones can fully integrate into the social fabric. The lack of prolonged cultural buy-in doesn’t tie aesthetics to specific people and places, allowing the rise of identity markers that exist exclusively online. In this context, AR Filters serve as a waste-less pathway of beauty storytelling with real-world influence.
WASTELESS PATHWAYS OF BEAUTY STORYTELLING
This was illustrated by the explosive popularity of Pat McGrath's Porcelain Skin look from the Margiela FW24 runway. The look utilizes a thin layer of a cucumber mask to mimic the supernaturally lustrous finish of AR filters. While narratively adjacent to the Dollettes, the practical requirement for constant water reapplication to maintain the cucumber mask's moisture—and to prevent it from cracking—renders Pat McGrath’s Porcelain look impractical for real-world use.
The rise of digitally-driven cultural narratives and advancements in technology is bringing about the dawn of phygital beauty, an era in which beauty storytelling through makeup and face embellishments reach beyond their physical capabilities.
Emerging brands are making strides in this space. The Unseen is creating eyeshadows that change color with your camera’s flash, while Shu Uemura’s 3D Stickers unlock a realm of exclusive augmented reality content when viewed through an iPhone camera. This could be taken to new heights with the Apple Vision Pro world, where digital-native brands and creators will be able to create physical objects that unlock digital experiences and content. Therefore, phygital beauty has the potential to anchor digital storytelling into the physical world.
“The girls who get it, get it, and those who don’t, don’t spend enough time online.”
From the earliest days of civilization, storytelling has been crucial in building connections and communities. Stories unite people through shared experiences, fostering a sense of belonging. By removing digital storytelling from the context of algorithms, phygital beauty has the potential to reinvigorate community spirit. In this light, phygital beauty becomes a medium for communal identity and collective expression, with brands facilitating new forms of social interaction and community building.
Yet, the core of storytelling and community lies in its openness and free access. In an era dominated by performance and consumption, we are reminded that the most impactful stories are those shared freely. Although phygital beauty opens up new avenues for community engagement, its success in creating real connections will depend on our dedication to keeping these stories free from the constraints of performance metrics and consumption imperatives.
Collective Conscious-ness
How fashion virality, immaterial luxury and conspicuous consumption converge.
By Sahir Ahmed
In a world where digital connectivity shapes not only how we communicate but also how we consume, the enmeshing of consumer culture and technology has ushered in a new era of luxury. What was once a novel way to connect with others, social media feeds have transformed into advertising spaces as ubiquitous as billboards and street posters. This constant stream, driven by algorithms that personalize content for each user, has led to a blurring of lines between personal interaction and commercial promotion in the online sphere. As users engage with content tailored to their preferences and behaviors, the distinction between genuine interaction and marketing messaging becomes increasingly indistinct. For luxury brands navigating an increasingly saturated market, achieving virality has become a key indicator of relevance and value.
Take Coperni’s viral moment in 2022, for example. After spray-painting a dress onto an almost-naked Bella Hadid, Google searches for ‘Coperni’ surged significantly. The moment took over social media in a matter of hours, leading to tens of thousands of posts across channels reaching audiences beyond the fashion industry. According to co-founder Arnaud Vaillant, Coperni gained over 300,000 followers overnight, and as reported by Launchmetrics, in the 48 hours following the show, the media impact value of the moment was measured at $26.3 million, including $20.9 million on social media.
The stunt was more than just a moment in fashion; it became a cultural phenomenon, underscoring a profound shift in consumer behavior and the perception of luxury. While the dress itself wasn’t mass-produced, participating in the viral moment served as a digital parallel to owning the physical product. This season, the brand unveiled its Air Swipe Bag, crafted from NASA’s nanomaterial silica aerogel to similar public reaction. The video has 5.1 million views.
Through the lens of brands like Coperni, Balenciaga, Diesel and others we witness not only the power of spectacle but also the active participation of consumers in the construction of cultural identities and values in digital-age consumerism.
French philosopher Guy Debord describes the phenomenon as a social relationship mediated by images, wherein consumer culture reduces life to a series of spectacular images. In the realm of luxury, this spectacle manifests as the carefully curated narratives and visual representations crafted by brands to entice consumers and shape their desires.
The ongoing transformation in fashion coincides with a shift towards technological innovation
Through the lens of brands like Coperni, Balenciaga, Diesel and others we witness not only the power of spectacle but also the active participation of consumers in the construction of cultural identities and values in digital-age consumerism. French philosopher Guy Debord describes the phenomenon as a social relationship mediated by images, wherein consumer culture reduces life to a series of spectacular images. In the realm of luxury, this spectacle manifests as the carefully curated narratives and visual representations crafted by brands to entice consumers and shape their desires.
As brands strive to maintain public appeal. In an era where consumers prioritize experiences and intangible values over material possessions, there is a growing desire for deeper connections — be it emotional, immersive experiences or a sense of belonging.
Concurrently, consumer shopping behaviors are changing; people are becoming more conscious of their consumption patterns, gravitating towards brands with sustainability practices and diving deeper into the ethical considerations that come with many of today’s purchases.
Yet, for a tangible change, transparency has to start from day one. The manufacturing process of physical goods involves organic, raw materials, and labor, often coupled with a lack of production transparency. According to Forbes, an estimated 30% of all manufactured goods end up as waste within months of rolling off the production line. While digital production does have its own ethical concerns, including electricity use and the energy consumption of servers, it often poses fewer environmental issues than traditional warehouse manufacturing. As per the U.S. EPA, industrial activities are responsible for 30% of electricity-related U.S. greenhouse gas emissions in comparison to 1% from data centers and data transmission networks (IEA).
an estimated 30% of all manufactured goods end up as waste
The emergence of metaverse ecosystems across platforms where users can interact with each other and digital objects in recent years has made us question its potential ability to transform our self-expression into a form of sustainability. That coupled with a growing interest in digital wearables could mean a future of dressing in a digital medium, unbounded by the grease-stained shoes of our wasteful present. Non-material luxuries exist primarily in the virtual realm, blurring the boundaries between physical and digital identity and ownership. They can provide an assertion of identity and social standing through the lens of digital uniqueness and innovation rather than through traditional wealth.
Anyone with a smartphone can enjoy the prestige and pleasure of luxury items without contributing to the clutter and waste associated with physical ownership. While digital luxuries can be copied infinitely without loss of quality, that doesn’t mean infinite quantities of beloved products. Blockchain technology allows for the creation of scarcity and provenance through NFTs and similar mechanisms, making them both more accessible to a wider audience (through lower production and distribution costs) and still exclusive (by creating limited editions or one-of-a-kind pieces).
For Brennan Russo, Co-founder and Chief Brand Officer of MNTGE, a digital vintage archive created in 2022, the “dematerialization of luxury means less is more,” bringing a sharper focus to the “value on the overall shopping experience, rather than the product itself.” Despite the collective fear of the metaverse, “today’s consumers want more than purchasing something — they want to be able to believe in the brand and connect with it, especially if it’s a hefty investment.”
While non-material luxury is no panacea to the ecological problem, it bypasses much of the waste created by the manufacturing industry, as there are no physical products to discard. This new playground, which maintains the self-expression we all crave, may just swing us into a future where fashion does more good than grief. The convergence of dematerialized luxury and digital technologies present a unique opportunity to reimagine the relationship between consumption, self-expression, and sustainability.
Cosmetic enhancements have long been the norm – but the final frontier? Something a lot more fantastical...
By Alex Peters
In a world where you’re not restricted by your anatomical make-up, what would you choose to look like? Maybe your first instinct is something safe. You imagine the features that have been traditionally celebrated: smoother skin, straighter teeth, thicker hair, a smaller waist, or bulging biceps. Then you start to think a bit bigger. If you can be anything, why not push the boundaries? Maybe you’ve always wanted wings. Webbed feet could be useful. As the shackles fall away, your mind expands to allow for an idea of beauty that isn’t one we’ve been taught and sold since birth; the possibilities proliferate endlessly.
From gaming to social media and the metaverse, we’re increasingly spending time in digital realms, and thanks to augmented and virtual reality, we have the tools to shape how we look while we’re there. Digital spaces have given us unprecedented control over our own image and with technology advancing every day, it’s never been easier to play around with our appearance and express ourselves in any way we want. Now, as the boundaries between physical reality and the virtual world become more blurred, these digital identities–our avatars–are becoming ever-more important.
What they look like could become a battleground upon which battles of identity, bodily autonomy, and representation rights are fought.
In the beginning only gods and kings who were given avatars. Colossal statues of pharaohs flanked temples and tombs in ancient Egypt immortalising the rulers as divine authorities. Clay figurines in the likeness of Greek deities disseminated accessible images of idols to the people, while masterful portraits of monarchs denoted their power and grandeur. Avatars were for the worshipped and the ruling–there was a level of importance required in order to be represented. Then came photography and then movies, television, video games, the world wide web; internet porn, chat forums, The Sims, social media, smartphones, Second Life, Snapchat dog ears, virtual meetings, Slack, Animal Crossing, GANs, metaverse fashion week, AI filters. Suddenly we all have avatars and we have them all over the place.
Everyone alive today is part of what
quantitative futurist Amy Webb calls “Generation Transition,” named for the great transition we are living through. What society will look like when the dust has settled after our current technology revolution has completed its cycle will be extremely different to how it is today. The role avatars will play in this new society – the importance they will hold in our day-to-day lives – is already beginning to be revealed. Companies ranging from IT consultants Accenture to Lawson, a convenience store chain in Japan, have started implementing avatars in their workforce. The fashion industry is working on creating digital twins for customers so they can try on clothes virtually. You can turn your pet into an avatar and also your dead mother. She can speak at her your own funeral. Meanwhile, social issues that affect us in the “real” world are starting to cross over, from the widespread “e-doping” among sports avatars to police investigating virtual sexual assaults.
From how we work and shop to how we date and learn new skills, we are moving into a world where many of us will be doing daily tasks in the metaverse, says futurist and trend forecaster Geraldine Wharry.
Unlike for the ancient pharaohs, avatars are no longer just external representations, reproduced likenesses that exist outside of the body; now avatars are our intermediaries. “It’s moving from just a fun filter to literally the thing that you live through,” says Wharry. We are being transformed into part-human, part-digital entities inhabiting a world where the boundaries between the real and the virtual are constantly blurred. And if avatars are going to be vital aspects of our identity in the future–maybe even the interface through which the majority of our social and professional interactions are mediated–then how they look will be a key element to how we live and how we are perceived.
From their most rudimentary, basic origins, avatars held an importance. “Even in extremely simple systems, where your ‘avatar’ might just be a thumbnail, a square static image, a few pixels, even then people pay a lot of attention to what those avatars look like,” said Neal Stephenson, author of Snow Crash and the man who coined the term “metaverse”, in a 2022 interview with Dazed magazine.
These days, avatars have advanced far past static thumbnails. Thanks to MMORPG games like World of Warcraft, metaverse platforms like Decentraland and character creation tools like IMVU or Daz3D (which last year launched a text-to-character AI tool), with a few clicks you can create and customise your avatar to appear however you want. Technology has given us the tools to completely reimagine the body outside of traditional notions of what humans look like and its physical capabilities. The possibilities to become strange and surreal creatures are endless–in theory.
In reality, our ability to sculpt and mold an avatar is limited by our skill set. For the majority of people who don’t have the technical and creative skills to build avatars from scratch, we rely on buying pre-existing templates and models provided by these companies and platforms. All too often, these templates offer a narrow, limiting idea of beauty and what people look like, full of the old biases that are held by the (often) straight, white cis men who create these tools.
“Our virtual world wasn’t born from a post-feminist, post-racial, utopian landscape,” says Ellen Atlanta, beauty critic and author of Pixel Flesh: How Toxic Beauty Culture Harms Women. “It has been built in the image of our current culture–it’s a mirror, and a distorted one because our virtual world doesn’t come with the same regulations and responsibilities of our physical reality.”
Many online representations, particularly for women, tend towards conventionally attractive and even hyper-sexualised, built around unrealistic, heteronormative ideals rooted in the porn industry and fantasy video games. Variety when it comes to diverse skin tone, hair styles, body size, disabilities, physical “flaws” (acne, scars, stretch marks, wrinkles etc.) and things like cultural markings can be hard to find. “These tools and apps reflect and compound biases that already exist within our society and reward those who already closely resemble the ideal,” says Atlanta. “When creating our avatars, we must consider what is being filtered out–often it’s the features that make us individual, that make us human.”
In a world where you’re not restricted by your anatomical make-up, what would you choose to look like? Maybe your first instinct is something safe. You imagine the features that have been traditionally celebrated: smoother skin, straighter teeth, thicker hair, a smaller waist, or bulging biceps. Then you start to think a bit bigger. If you can be anything, why not push the boundaries? Maybe you’ve always wanted wings. Webbed feet could be useful. As the shackles fall away, your mind expands to allow for an idea of beauty that isn’t one we’ve been taught and sold since birth; the possibilities proliferate endlessly.
From gaming to social media and the metaverse, we’re increasingly spending time in digital realms, and thanks to augmented and virtual reality, we have the tools to shape how we look while we’re there. Digital spaces have given us unprecedented control over our own image and with technology advancing every day, it’s never been easier to play around with our appearance and express ourselves in any way we want. Now, as the boundaries between physical reality and the virtual world become more blurred, these digital identities–our avatars–are becoming ever-more important. What they look like could become a battleground upon which battles of identity, bodily autonomy, and representation rights are fought.
In the beginning only gods and kings who were given avatars. Colossal statues of pharaohs flanked temples and tombs in ancient Egypt immortalising the rulers as divine authorities. Clay figurines in the likeness of Greek deities disseminated accessible images of idols to the people, while masterful portraits of monarchs denoted their power and grandeur. Avatars were for the worshipped and the ruling–there was a level of importance required in order to be represented. Then came photography and then movies, television, video games, the world wide web; internet porn, chat forums, The Sims, social media, smartphones, Second Life, Snapchat dog ears, virtual meetings, Slack, Animal Crossing, GANs, metaverse fashion week, AI filters. Suddenly we all have avatars and we have them all over the place.
Everyone alive today is part of what quantitative futurist Amy Webb calls “Generation Transition,” named for the great transition we are living through. What society will look like when the dust has settled after our current technology revolution has completed its cycle will be extremely different to how it is today. The role avatars will play in this new society – the importance they will hold in our day-to-day lives – is already beginning to be revealed.
Companies ranging from IT consultants Accenture to Lawson, a convenience store chain in Japan, have started implementing avatars in their workforce. The fashion industry is working on creating digital twins for customers so they can try on clothes virtually. You can turn your pet into an avatar and also your dead mother. She can speak at her your own funeral. Meanwhile, social issues that affect us in the “real” world are starting to cross over, from the widespread “e-doping” among sports avatars to police investigating virtual sexual assaults.
From how we work and shop to how we date and learn new skills, we are moving into a world where many of us will be doing daily tasks in the metaverse, says futurist and trend forecaster Geraldine Wharry. Unlike for the ancient pharaohs, avatars are no longer just external representations, reproduced likenesses that exist outside of the body; now avatars are our intermediaries. “It’s moving from just a fun filter to literally the thing that you live through,” says Wharry. We are being transformed into part-human, part-digital entities inhabiting a world where the boundaries between the real and the virtual are constantly blurred. And if avatars are going to be vital aspects of our identity in the future–maybe even the interface through which the majority of our social and professional interactions are mediated–then how they look will be a key element to how we live and how we are perceived.
From their most rudimentary, basic origins, avatars held an importance. “Even in extremely simple systems, where your ‘avatar’ might just be a thumbnail, a square static image, a few pixels, even then people pay a lot of attention to what those avatars look like,” said Neal Stephenson, author of Snow Crash and the man who coined the term “metaverse”, in a 2022 interview with Dazed magazine.
Research has shown, however, that the majority of people want their digital avatars to represent their real-life individual identities. According to a 2022 Roblox study, 70% of young people make their avatars dress similar to their IRL style. So, as demand for avatars grows in the coming years, a whole marketplace of companies that offer different types of avatars is going to be created to fulfil these needs. “[It will be] the same way you find fashion brands that you feel really represent you,” says Wharry. “Except this is more intimate. It’s how you actually look. So we’re going to have all sorts of ecosystems of who you identify with in terms of these avatar makes. Who is going to portray you in the way that you feel most represents you?”
70% of young people make their avatars dress similar to their IRL style
In our current society, the metaverse and digital avatars are still, on the whole, an optional pursuit, meaning something that you can quite easily opt-out from. But if–or when, according to futurists like Webb – the time comes when everything we do is reliant on the metaverse, the companies that emerge as the big winners of the avatar marketplace will have a unique power to shape and control what the digital population looks like. And deciding to offer, or not offer, certain options (be it types of skin colour, birthmarks, disabilities etc.) could amount to a kind of virtual eugenics, where people’s ability to present in a certain way is eliminated and whole sections of the population disappear from the metaverse. “You can see your own sense of beauty and individual expression being hacked by this entire economic and technological ecosystem that literally should have nothing to do with your own modes of self-expression,” says Wharry.
Luckily, outside of the dominant players, companies and creatives are emerging that are challenging these mainstream avatar-creation tools and giving people agency over their own appearances. The NFTY Collective are working to ensure that people with seen and unseen disabilities and differences are included in emerging tech like the metaverse. Meanwhile Idoru, founded by humanist technologist Mica Le John and former fashion art director Michael Taylor, enables people to create realistic looking avatars of themselves from scratch–with no already-built ideal bodies used as a starting point. The avatars on Idoru are designed to be such a realistic extension of your identity that you can add even hyperpigmentation and eczema to the skin.
The freedoms of the digital world also allow for more experimental or escapist approaches to how the body is represented. Otherworldly aesthetics have been embraced by artists like Nick Knight, whose project Ikon-1 aimed to introduce an element of beauty and artistry to avatars–and ensure it wasn’t just Mark Zuckerberg and corporations shaping the metaverse. Berlin-based artist collective Crosslucid explore ideas of identity and intimacy in the digital sphere, reimagining human alliances with technology, while Brazilian artist Gabriel Massan uses digital animation and AR to create vast, multichromatic universes inhabited by abstract entities. Through its decentralisation of the human figure, Massan’s art explores notions of otherness and the colonial systems entrenched in Brazil’s history. Beyond this, as the technology continues to advance, so do the creative possibilities and potential for radical self-expression. Wharry sees a future where, thanks to devices that track our biometrics, our internal thoughts and feelings will give immediate feedback that can be represented externally–your mood changes and all of a sudden your make-up changes, for example.
Ultimately, how we represent ourselves is deeply intimate and personal, and as we increasingly rely on and trust avatar technology to hold our existence, the question of agency will be of paramount importance. Who owns our avatar, who are we handing over power to, and how commodified will it become? The metaverse could offer a space free from so many of the things that make our world inaccessible and unjust, and now it’s about ensuring that these companies approach it in an ethical and creative way–something which isn’t currently the case. “Whilst some creators are harnessing the limitless potential of virtual reality to play with identity, create surreal masterpieces and defy traditional beauty standards, that is still largely a fringe group within a still-functioning hierarchy of ideals,” says Atlanta. Moving forward, creatives must be included in conversations around biases, AI inclusivity, originality, and agency. If the time comes when we are living our lives wholly virtually, then these questions around agency and having control over what avatars look like become not just hypothetical thought starters but questions, Wharry says, of legal rights. “People think the internet is a human right. Will being able to choose and lead our avatars be a human right?” she says. “When I think of the future, that’s what I think of.”
A DAY IN THE ...
A digital creative and internet sensation makes AI magic out of the mundane of everyday existence.
By Johanna JaskowskaPresent
One Of The Things Are Just Like The Other.
Thanks to the algorithm – is our quest for unique style seemingly making us all the same?
By Ryan Yip
The speed of online content consumption and production is like nothing we've ever seen. It changed the way we interact with each other, and it fundamentally changed how and what we spend our time on. In the context of fashion, social media has introduced it to people from all angles: thrifting, style inspirations (from here, it will be referred to as style inspo), fashion history, runway reports, etc. Not only did it serve as an introduction, but social media quickly became a reliable source of fashion knowledge. However, how the internet has evolved into a needy machine that favors creators' posting consistency and volume, which inadvertently leads to an overproduction of mediocre and, at times, meaningless content. In this paper, I will discuss how the algorithm affected the always-on fashion community's perception of Fashion, the importance of Fashion, the power of Fashion, and how social media glorifies consumption and indirectly canonizes the association with aesthetics. By identifying how tech is affecting our relationship with fashion, we can pinpoint potential for positive impact, whether on an individual or collective level.
The fabric of Fashion is multilayered, presenting itself in many different forms. To dedicated fashion scholars, it is a social phenomenon that extends into various facets of life; to some, it can be a signal system for cultural sophistication and wealth; to the rest, it is an authentic and playful way to express themselves. There isn't one general way to define what Fashion is, but a phantom thread sews through most layers: a desire to differentiate. From the moment we as a culture are aware of Fashion, we desperately try to separate ourselves from others through semiotics. From individual stylistic choices to the extreme of sumptuary laws, a royal effort to ban commoners from wearing a certain fabric, colors, or pattern. Not that I agree that anyone should ban anything, but the sentiment behind this makes total sense.
Feeding this desire to differentiate and the constant yearning for fresh content into the current hyper-individualistic cultural landscape where social media maximizes our visibility to the world, the need to stand out exacerbates. As a result, the always-on fashion community resorted to consumption to keep that freshness going. Whether it is the consumption of clothes or trends, relying on external resources to stay inspired, chasing that 'high.'
From Get Ready With Me (GRWM) to shopping hauls, we've become hyper-voyeuristic in style. On the one hand, it is the creator's chance to show off their new outfit ideas; on the other hand, content consumption seems never-ending. Consumption over application. Moreover, social media algorithms favor consistent content creation, which means anyone who bases their content on style and shows outfit inspos will have to come up with new outfits to satisfy the algorithm. The last thing we want in this day and age is to be forgotten by the algorithm, am I right? However, one can only do many combinations and permutations with one's limited closet. The solution? Fast fashion, which created the infamous and widely criticized #sheinhaul trend on TikTok, accumulating over eight hundred thousand posts and the wave of unhealthy shopping hauls.
The online fashion community sometimes forgets about the essence of personal style: time. With time, personal style matures. But when TikTok and Instagram are constantly broadcasting 'styling tutorials,' 'styling guides,' and 'how to dress like ____' onto everyone's explore page, how is it in anyone's interest to slow down, take their time and figure out what works best for them, when they can copy and paste from the web? Copy and pasting isn't wrong; it is one of the best first contacts with fashion, but it sure does ruin one's relationship with fashion if one believes copy and pasting is all there is for personal style. But once again, why would anyone do otherwise when copying is so easy, and to be fair, they are pretty good-looking outfits! There is an imbalance of narratives, though; many people are pushing cookie-cutter style templates, and not enough people talk about taking fashion slowly. The more counterintuitive type of styling content I've encountered is 'wardrobe essentials.' While the intention behind these videos is purely educational, targeting those who have just gotten into fashion or are taking steps to upgrade their style, these videos may distort one's concept of style-that everyone needs a certain piece to start developing style. Wrong. Everyone's different. Therefore, each person's essentials are different. This inadvertence, or should I say a need to preach and position themselves as style icons, instilled many people with a false sense of style.
Closely related to the general act of differentiation online is the skill to curate and their choice of aesthetics. To 'curate a vibe' and what aesthetics they align themselves to has become a fashion accessory. This method is only effective online, I suppose it is hard to display taste in person at the same rate as posting content. The idea is to signal cultural sophistication and uniqueness. As Tim Clark stated, "In modern times, the word purports to describe individuals engaged in an eclectic array of activities–composing playlists, styling "looks," designing menus, planning holidays, reordering bookshelves, coordinating music festivals, managing Instagram accounts, devising immersive cinema, etc. - as 'an honorific for the organizing of practically anything by just about anyone." (Clark, 2021) The act of curation, which was thought to require formal studies, is now adopted by many as an extension of self, displaying to the world who they are. It is in Fashion to understand the nuances of curation. Quoting Tim Edwards in his book Fashion In Focus: Concepts, Practices And Politics, "cultural intermediaries are often self-appointed arbiters of taste editors, advertisers, and similar media – workers who make and promote their judgments concerning what is "good" or "bad," "in" or "out," in terms of taste, style, and Fashion." (Edwards, 2011) This expertise, having an 'eye' for anything lifestyle-related, as Clark exhaustively listed, has become an online status symbol.
Drawing connections to the unquenchable desire to stand out, curating a vibe, and curating style aesthetics has been the final puzzle piece for many to help complete the signaling of cultural sophistication. Sometimes, I even think the word ‘curation’ cannot be used in this context; all we did was create pseudo trends, give them catchy names, and brand them as the 'next big thing' or the more exclusive 'if you know, you know' type. Can we even class that as a curation of style? Or the curation of anything at all? Honestly, if these trends had slowly matured into something more timeless, where people genuinely found a sense of belonging and comfort, that's not the case. This type of lifestyle curation is for longevity; it isn't for the screens but for the person's soul. But I guess adopting a word with such weight makes the product even more enticing.
The algorithm had made it seem like style and taste come from cookie-cutter wardrobe essentials or lists of unelaborated fashion hot takes. Is that why it's getting so popular? Instead of the widely quoted and studied "conspicuous consumption," a word coined by Thorstein Veblen in his book, The Theory of the Leisure Class, in 1899, which stands for "consuming to enhance one's status," it seems like the online community has branched out into "conspicuous trendsetting" and "conspicuous curation." By succumbing to social media algorithms and satisfying the need to stand out from the mass online crowd, the always-on community has successfully altered some of our relationships with fashion consumption and how our online identity is perceived.
Past
Multihyphenates Helena Dong and Nigel Matambo explain why the AR revolution may well be humanity’s greatest collaboration.
Intro By Gunseli Yalcinkaya
If the past few years of digitally-enhanced creativity have taught us anything, it’s that technology can offer us endless possibilities for self-expression. Whether it’s AR, VR, or digital wearables, it’s no secret that creative tech is vastly transforming the ways we interact with each other. Adding new and augmented layers of experience for the new era of the internet, digital avatars and VR headsets open up new reality settings to help us experiment and play with our identities both on and off-screen.
At the forefront of the digital-spatial continuum are designers Helena Dong and Nigel Matambo, some of the scene’s most promising innovators using AR and VR to blur the lines between reality and fiction. Both came up in the face-filtered, iPhone-led boom of augmented reality across socials in 2020, with Dong creating experiences for the likes of A24, Nike, and Prada, while Matambo, also known as Sununguro, working with the likes of Virgil Abloh, Louis Vuitton, and Samuel Ross.
After first encountering each other’s work on a dedicated AR community Facebook group, the pair found themselves working on 2022’s mind-bending Coachellaverse, the first-ever livestream to add AR-enhanced performance into a music festival, before eventually meeting IRL last year in California. Bonding over their interdisciplinary approach to creative tech – both creators draw inspiration from across fashion and music – they believe in the revolutionary potential of digital fashion as an accessible way to tap into unexplored parts of ourselves, using 3D meta-aesthetics to imagine a more inclusive future.
Technological breakthroughs as ‘humanity’s greatest collaboration’
How did you first come across each other? What were your first impressions?
Nigel Matambo:
I first came across Helena's work pretty early in the Spark AR field. I think I came across some of your
filters initially and then I saw your posts on Facebook. The attention to detail was just unlike anything I'd
ever seen before.
Helena Dong:
Thank you so much for saying that. I feel like with you, it’s a similar story. I've known of your work since
2020 and that was also around the time when I started to become interested in creative tech. It was also just
me sleuthing across the AR community and saw something you posted. My first impression was, ‘wow, this work is
so cool’. But, in all seriousness, there’s this level of visual and conceptual sensibility to your work that I
haven’t seen with a lot of other experiences.
Were there any particular artists or creatives that made you want to explore the field?
Nigel Matambo:
For me, it would’ve been Johanna [Jaskowska] and her collaboration with Mercedes. I was just blown away by the
idea that an individual can collaborate with a brand, and that relationship can be synergistic. But also that
brands were looking for collaborators that have that kind of sensibility was really something I was inspired
by.
Helena Dong:
Looking at my influences, most of them actually don't actively participate in the realm of spatial tech, but
rather across different fields and disciplines. The common denominator is that their work is typically
interdisciplinary and are always matched with this notion of play. Hussein Chalayan, the fashion designer, for
example, has always been a key figure of influence in my life. I come from a fashion design background, and
Chalayan represents the epitome of experimental fashion. I remember doing research when I was quite young when
I saw this coffee table dress that he made. It was a skirt from the AW00 collection and it blew my mind.
Where do you draw your inspiration from and how does this inform your work?
Nigel Matambo:
I came from the perspective of trying to look at access. I look at things like fashion and music as being very
inaccessible to someone who isn’t already immersed in that, and I wanted to find an entry point. Beyond that,
it was more so trying to look at a really expensive luxury item, whether that’s a pair of glasses or a
wearable, and making it free through AR. I found that very interesting because luxury doesn’t usually work
like that.
Helena Dong:
I definitely agree with that. Not needing to be reliant on physical materials is a really powerful way for
creators to get their ideas out into the world.
How would you describe your own relationship to the digital world, and what role does fashion play in this?
Nigel Matambo:
I feel like there's an importance with the real and the tangible that I don't want to let go of. Digital is
amazing for a lot of different reasons in that it allows expressions that are kind of surreal and fanciful.
But I think the challenge that exists with digital is who has access to what. We’re at a key moment in our
digital identities in that a lot more time is being spent on these social media platforms and modes of
expression. Right now, the creators are people who have the time and access to be able to create and share
work, whereas the people who are spectators tend to be the people who can’t take part. That’s the big
challenge going forward.
Helena Dong:
When we look at the fashion and the tech industries, there’s a symbiotic relationship, because both industries
are constantly propelled by change and innovation at these speed cycles. I do think that the verge of the
merging of fashion and tech is inevitable, and it has always been the case.
I do want to emphasize that the extension into digital wearables is not meant to be offered up as replacement to physical fashion. It's meant to be perceived as a form of diversification for the industry. It's a branch that is growing within the existing framework of fashion. And it's through this technology that designers and consumers have additional ways of engaging with the concept of fashion. If we think of it as a space to play, then this playground is expanding. And the space for speculative design is also becoming more attainable through the emergence of these new platforms with low barriers to entry.
Nigel Matambo:
Yeah, it's not necessarily an issue like supplanting what’s real but more adding a different lane to what
already exists. Different modes of expression just add to different ways of communicating, like having the
emojis as ways of showing emotions parallels hieroglyphics. I feel like all of these things are continuations
of our need to just communicate and be understood.
It reminds me of back in the playground when you had Pokémon cards or whatever. You had something common that didn't divide you – you just found something that you gravitate more towards. That’s how I see these new modes of expression, adding this level of fun and play to more serious realms, and I feel like that’s what’s needed in this level of diverse interaction.
Helena Dong:
There's more room for experimentation. We can more easily adopt personas, try out new things without any kind
of commitment, and have this opportunity to see ourselves through a lens that we might not encounter in the
real world. So now there's a lot of ease and fluidity to it. When we design clothes and accessories in AR or
MR we’re designing them in a way that makes them responsive. They transform, they react to our movements, our
gestures and emotions sometimes. And they're able to bring our attention to the ways in which our sense of
self and our sense of presence is directly influencing our surroundings. And I think that can be a very
powerful way to tell stories.
Nigel Matambo:
Seeing people wearing a VR headset out is also very interesting to experience. I was doing this at airports
years ago but now it's becoming mainstream. I'm excited because it just adds to the normalization of these
virtual modes of expression. It's no longer seen as strange or weird, it's just a new format, and a new kind
of way of experiencing the world.
Helena Dong:
Yeah [VR] is in its teenage phase. It’s out but it hasn’t fully matured. When it comes to attitudes towards
wearables, discussions around it definitely accelerated with the hype of the metaverse. Right now, we're at a
point where it’s moving at a much more stable pace, where people are beginning to ponder the practicality of
these designs, working out the framework in which these creations can exist and proliferate. And I think it's
only a matter of time before AR and MR become a more interesting way for us to move through the world,
especially with AR glasses or spatial computing devices. And it makes sense for us to be able to wear these
virtual products, and not only wear them, but have a consistent appearance in the eyes of others.
Given the rapid pace at which new technologies are being released, how do you stay up to date with the latest tech available, while allowing space for experimentation and play?
Nigel Matambo:
There's this idea of adapting or continuous adaptation you have to be aware of. But, also, simultaneously,
you're learning and experimenting. Finding a balance between mastering the tools, the new tools that have been
released, as well as being aware of what tools are kind of on the horizon, as well as being aware of what
tools are currently available to you. I feel like as these tools evolve, there will be ways of executing ideas
that you had years ago that you can only do now. I'm just trying to be as ready for this as possible. It
requires an almost delusional type of thinking, because there's no way of being able to predict what's coming
next.
Helena Dong:
Yeah, we're all navigating this turbulent landscape together. We're at a point where we're second guessing the
authenticity of everything we see online. As people who work with digital mediums, I think it's only natural
to feel threatened by all these changes. I don't think all these changes that we're witnessing is the enemy
and it's not it's it's what they do represent is a paradigm shift. And so whether we embrace it or renounce
it, it's already here.
Where do you see creative tech heading in the future, especially with the mainstreaming of AI and other breakthroughs?
Nigel Matambo:
I've been taking a lot of really conceptual approaches with my work and I feel like AI as a tool will help to
synthesise and communicate a lot of the ideas. My role then becomes optimisation and thinking about the larger
idea beyond the work of trying to communicate it. If we see [AI] as more of a collab, like humanity's greatest
collaboration, there's less issue with things like ownership, because it's no longer my thing, it’s our thing
that we’re all working on. It will also help individuals who might not have access to some of the tools or
technologies or even knowledge. You just have to exist and have a point of view.
Helena Dong:
Did you say humanity's greatest collaboration? Yeah, absolutely. I love that. It's such a profound way of
putting it.
Nigel Matambo:
Absolutely, because I think this idea of ownership takes away from how much access it gives to people that
might not have the utilities.
Helena Dong:
Yeah, it's a form of level setting. And now we can all get to the essence of ideas. I agree with everything
you're saying. And I do think that it's going to lead to hybridised methodologies. I think what it's also
doing is asking us to adjust on mindset from the design of singular outcomes, like when we think about product
design, or experience design, to the design of parameters and structures so that we can reach the optimal
outcomes, which is perhaps not not the most natural thing when it comes to creatives, because we kind of bask
in the joy of creative sparks.
WHAT DOES YOUR FACE SAY ABOUT YOU?
Historically, facial adornments have always had currency, but what’s its exchange rate in an increasingly digital landscape?
By Emilia PetrarcaArguably more than our fingerprints, our faces are the keys that unlock everything these days — our phones and even our front doors, but also an understanding of who we are as people. For centuries, the face was a blank canvas for adornment; piercings, tattoos, henna, and jewelry helped to convey important messages about a person’s social standing, beliefs, and preferences. Nose piercings, for example, placed in specific spots, could indicate in certain cultures that a person was married. The size of a lip plate could also indicate the number of cattle a husband would have to pay for a woman’s dowry. (The bigger the lip plate, the more cattle.)
Of course, facial adornment also had aesthetic value, too. The more a face was covered, the more beautiful it was perhaps perceived as. But aesthetics can fall out of favor, and over time, as European beauty standards became more culturally dominant, the opposite became true. By the late 1500s, a beauty mark was all that was seen as even remotely acceptable in French society, for example. A small black silk taffeta or velvet patch, affixed to the face with adhesive or saliva, could draw attention, highlighting a person’s eyes and mouth, without drawing too much attention — or the wrong kind. “It was a very sexual ornament but also safe and inoffensive,” says Dr. Kimberly Chrisman-Campbell, an Early Modern fashion scholar, in an article for Collector’s Weekly on the subject. “It became a symbol for this whole world of getting dressed, the nudity and all that that implies, without ever showing anything truly private.”
How did facial adornment go from being a form of self-expression to a form of self-isolation? As Guy Debord explains in The Society of the Spectacle (1967), the pressures of capitalism and beauty standards go hand-in-hand. “The first stage of the economy’s domination of social life brought about an evident degradation of being into having — human fulfillment was no longer equated with what one was, but with what one possessed,” he writes. “The present stage, in which social life has become completely dominated by the accumulated productions of the economy, is bringing about a general shift from having to appearing — all ‘having’ must now derive its immediate prestige and its ultimate purpose from appearances.”
81% of hiring managers stated that piercings and tattoos affect their perception of the candidate negatively
To ‘have,’ or more specifically, to have a job in the modern Western world, one likely has to sacrifice any facial adornment in order to be hired. In a 2006 survey done in the hospitality industry, for example, 81% of hiring managers stated that piercings and tattoos affect their perception of the candidate negatively. Of course, for the person who has the piercings and tattoos, they likely signal something positive — that they are anti-establishment, or that they belong to a certain religion or group. (Whether they are actually, genuinely any of these things is another matter.) But to the person whose job it is to hire them to do a job where appearances matter, such signals are likely antithetical to the kind of friendly uniformity they are hoping to convey.
Capitalism wants to see your face — to track you, to feed it to the algorithm, and to fuel your innate and eternal desire to make it more beautiful. In lieu of facial adornment as a tool for differentiating ourselves from a crowd, we’ve turned to makeup and plastic surgery as a way to more “naturally,” or inconspicuously, alter our appearance. “Instagram Face,” a term used to describe the kind of smooth, big-lipped, extremely contoured look proliferated by the Kardashians, has arguably become a modern symbol of this “having” Debord describes. Meanwhile, having acne, wrinkles, dark circles, etc., can put you at a disadvantage.
In 2020, though, everything changed. Suddenly, we were all asked to cover our faces, leveling the playing field and reminding us, in case we forgot, just how much our faces say about us and how valuable a tool they are. For some, anonymity was power. We were reminded of the protection that facial adornment like jewelry can offer—physically and emotionally—but also from facial recognition technologies, which now follow us everywhere from Whole Foods to the airport.
Although they highlighted our own human vulnerability, masks also perhaps rendered the face a little less precious. Who cares if you wear a pimple patch all day? Products like Star Face, for example, which function like modern-day beauty patches, only with the goal of covering blemishes, refute the idea that having bad skin is embarrassing. Having a “self-care” ritual that takes care of your face is the latest flex.
After so much time covering our faces, designers like Simone Rocha are embracing adorning them again. For the British designer’s FW24 collection, she worked with makeup artist Thomas de Kluyver to place gems, pearls, and crystals around models’ eyes. “I always love the idea that makeup is worn as a fashion accessory and is just an extension of your personality and identity,” de Kluyver told Vogue afterward. “So, this season for Simone I have taken that quite literally. Simone usually has so many embellishments and accessories in her show but this one was more toned down, so we discussed the idea of the makeup actually becoming an accessory itself.”
However alluring Simone Rocha’s beauty looks may be, they aren’t exactly easy to pull off in everyday life. But what if you could wear them digitally? So much face time today is literally spent on screens. Looking at my own day today, I will have spent just as much, if not more time looking at peoples’ faces over Zoom and Google Meet than I did in person. And in every single one of those instances, I had a filter on to smooth out my appearance. What if I hopped on a work call with a digital nose ring one day? Would my employer think less or more of me? Obviously, it depends. (I think I’d be okay.) But as our digital appearances become more and more important, specifically the upper half of our bodies, we’ll arguably see a resurgence in digital facial adornments as well.
Ironically, these futuristic technologies allow us a fresh start in a way, or a return to the beginning. My actual face may be covered by a VR headset, but my desire to tell you something about me remains. Wouldn’t you want to know how many cattle are in my dowry?
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