It’s that time of the year!
In just a few hours, some of India’s biggest couturiers will be unveiling months and months of painstaking craftsmanship at this year’s edition of India Couture Week. Now no one can quite, deny the still exclusive aura of the world of fashion showmanship. This is after all, the remnants of a culture that thrived on gatekeeping access to these spaces, let alone a seat at the table. Visibility was intentionally controlled, limited to glossy magazine spreads or a momentary television broadcast. The up-close-and-personal experience on the other hand, was the fiefdom of fashion editors, buyers and celebrities, seated front row.
The actual clothes still fit this template though the same can’t be said about the experience of the runway. For better or for worse, virtual accessibility to these worlds has only expanded times ten, the billion tiny screens across the country more than happily taking credit for this paradigm shift. And this in turn, has transformed the manner in which the runway experience itself is conceptualised.
Seasoned fashion show director, choreographer and events ideator, Vahbiz Mehta for one, has seen this shift take place in real time. She confirms, “Shows were essentially designed to showcase the next season collections with the intent to sell the collection. The real disruption came with digital and social media. The consumer transitioned from being niche to global. Now the front row is virtual and in real time,” elaborating how the journey of a collection from runway to retail, now stands defined by a digital afterlife.” This in turn has the potential to redefine clientele for the couture house in question.
And that in itself explains the redirection in conceptualisation such shows have taken in recent years. Mehta insists that honouring the designer’s vision for their collection – telling that story – will always top the priority list. However, she too, cannot deny the fact that revamping the lens with which she works through the details of mounting a show, requires a digitally-informed, recurring update: “Today, alongside the live audience in the room, I’m constantly factoring in a second, equally important viewer – the digital consumer. I still build a strong narrative arc where the choreography is still about garment visibility, but it’s also designed to be visualised clearly in short-form and sometimes vertical formats, conceptualising theatrics that will travel beyond the room.” The collection’s authenticity still remains the focal point, she clears, just the span of considerations has expanded: “My focus is not just how it plays to a live audience, I factor in how will it live-on in posterity.”
But ‘posterity’ these days comes with an undefined expiration date. Who wouldn’t love a hit of virality – even if it’s got nothing to do with the actual clothes in the collection? A celebrity moment on the ramp, a walk that may feel a little too theatrical, or even just the oddity of an avant-garde collection – social media often crowns a winner before well-curated professional reviews even get a fighting chance; and often, that’s the narrative that holds up, at least in the public conscience.
Still, virality for all practical purposes is largely a matter of chance. Anything ‘choreographed’ to that end, very much ends up looking like it. Mehta echoes: “The moment you try to manufacture (a viral moment), it usually shows and looks gimmicky. What can be designed is the staging and environment in which a moment has the potential to become viral.” A swiftly smartening audience is to laud or blame for this: “My endeavour is to engineer the stage, not force the outcome because audiences are very quick to sense when something is overly constructed for attention. The moments that travel the furthest are usually the ones that feel effortless and authentic – even if they’re happening with a very carefully directed framework.”
One thing however, that does get a collection’s foot in through this threshold, are celebrity showstoppers. Fashion purists are right to argue that the presence of a bourgeoning face may aid the collection’s ‘reach’, making it more palatable to the layman who isn’t expansively informed on the nuance of cuts, colours and couture. But this almost always comes at the cost of the craftsmanship itself playing second fiddle in a space that was meant to celebrate it.
Mehta measures her response for this: “The impact really depends on how intentionally it’s used. On one hand, the presence of influencers and celebrities has undeniably expanded the reach and visibility of the runway. It brings in larger audiences, amplifies the collection and helps fashion feel more accessible. But the flip side is when that becomes the focal point of the show, it can dilute the runway as a fashion-first space. The narrative shifts from the presentation to presenter. And once that happens, the clothes can become secondary to the moment, which goes against the very purpose of the runway.”
The digital audience tuning in to fashion shows, freely engaging through reels, shorts and commentary clips weren’t invited in – this is a direct by-product of the social media boom. Engagement with the space could stem from aspirational reaching, disdain, or plain simple boredom. But one thing is clear, there are a separate set of numbers – measured in views, likes and shares – these days defining the ‘success’ of a collection beyond what it makes in retail bills. Some couturiers welcome it, others pretend to be above it. Either way, there’s no challenging the evolved reality of modern day fashion shows: its biggest audience is everyone holding a phone.