New fashion: how social media changed the rules of fashion
Fashion is no longer developing along the usual "catwalk — gloss—store" trajectory. Today, new visual codes are being born not only in designer collections, but also in social networks, marketplace recommendations, and influencer feeds. Algorithms have accelerated the spread of trends and shortened their lifecycle, making the consumer an active participant in the process of their formation. Against this background, Fashion Weeks, traditionally considered the main source of new trends, are increasingly perceived as just one element of a complex system. Izvestia tried to figure out exactly where fashion is born today — and whether it exists in the same way as before.
How algorithms have changed the fashion
10-15 years ago, the path of the fashion trend was relatively predictable. New ideas were born in the studios of leading fashion houses, were first shown at Fashion Weeks, then hit the pages of glossy magazines, after which they were gradually adapted by brands in the middle price segment and only after a few months became part of the mass market. Today, this chain has changed almost beyond recognition.
Social media has made the trend-setting process much more open and dynamic. Now, a new fashion aesthetic can appear not only on the catwalk, but also in a short video, an influencer publication, or a viral challenge. Users are no longer just observers — they become participants in the process themselves.
However, it would be premature to say that the era of Fashion Weeks is over. According to Elena Ermakovishna, head of the Event Factory unit and lecturer of the Branding in the Fashion Industry course at the HSE School of Design, fashion shows still perform an important function, although their role has noticeably transformed.
— At the moment, they rather capture and enhance existing trends, making them more visible to the industry and the audience. Especially when a large number of designers simultaneously present their ideas in the same space, it helps to form a trend and consolidate it in the media field, — says Elena Ermakovishna.
Anna Lebsak-Kleimans, CEO of Fashion Consulting Group, gives a similar assessment. According to her, Fashion Weeks remain a key reference point for professionals, although they have long ceased to be the only source of new ideas. Mass brands are still closely monitoring the catwalks, adapting what they see to the needs of their audience, but trend analysis today is based on a much broader array of data.
Analysts are focused not only on screenings, but also on street style in major cities, shop windows, specialized exhibitions of fabrics and clothing, public appearances by celebrities, as well as processes taking place in art, music and cinema. The repeatability of such signals, the expert notes, makes it possible to distinguish a short-term information surge from a truly stable trend.
The mechanism of influence on the consumer has also changed. According to Elena Ermakovishna, designers and algorithms are now full-fledged participants in a single ecosystem. Brands continue to create ideas, form their own identity and build communication with the audience, while digital platforms significantly influence consumer preferences and the speed of dissemination of these ideas.
— Many conceptual brands, working primarily with meanings and values, consciously distance themselves from algorithmic promotion models and strive to maintain a more independent way of interacting with their audience, — the expert draws attention.
Anna Lebsak-Kleimans also emphasizes that the influence on the buyer today consists of a whole system of contacts.
— Social networks do not replace brands, but they become a powerful intermediary between the brand and the consumer. They don't so much create fashion from scratch as accelerate its spread, amplify some signals and quickly reset others," says Anna Lebsak-Kleimans.
The impact of algorithms differs depending on the generation of buyers. While representatives of generation X are more likely to focus on their own experience and brand reputation, digital content plays an important role for millennials along with rational choice. The most noticeable changes are taking place among the representatives of generation Z, who perceive fashion primarily through the recommendations of influencers and short videos.
Why seasonality is no longer relevant
Social media and digital platforms have radically accelerated the change of fashion trends, turning them into a stream of rapidly changing visual images. Ksenia Katysheva, a consultant on creative brand development and curator of the Fashion and Textile Design program at the British Graduate School of Design, told Izvestia that it is especially important today to distinguish between micro and macro trends. Microtrends don't last long and are largely shaped by social media algorithms, whereas macrotrends reflect deeper cultural and social changes.
— Previously, the trend could remain relevant for one or two seasons, today many microtrends exist for only a few weeks. This is how dozens of viral aesthetics have appeared in recent years, from Barbicore to office siren and tomato Girl," the expert emphasizes.
The speed of trend change does not mean that the entire industry has begun to live according to the laws of TikTok. The vivid picture of daily viral videos hides a much more inertial system: collection development, material search, production and logistics still require months and sometimes years of preparation. Therefore, as Anna Lebsak-Kleimans notes, forecasting in fashion has not only not lost its importance, but has become even more important.
"Planning and forecasting remain essential for investors, financing, marketing and production, as they are associated with a long cycle of developing and launching new ideas — from the appearance of new fibers and fabrics to the release of ready—made collections," the expert believes.
Brands are increasingly analyzing search queries, marketplace data, and user activity on TikTok and Pinterest, tracking interest in product categories almost in real time. Artificial intelligence helps to identify emerging demand faster and adjust production plans, but final decisions are still made by specialists who are able to distinguish a short-term surge of interest from a long-term trend.
At the same time, according to the expert, successful brands do not tend to respond to every viral trend from social networks. Despite the acceleration of the information cycle, the share of experimental silhouettes in seasonal collections is almost not increasing — such a strategy remains too risky from a commercial point of view.
— Even if the attention of customers is easily shifted, this does not mean that the brand should jump "from chair to chair." Strong brands don't fuss trying to keep up with TikTok; they recycle and interpret trends while staying true to their idea, proportions, and patterns," the expert emphasizes.
How marketplaces influence brand policy
Marketplaces have not only accelerated the path of a thing from an idea to a buyer, but have actually redefined the very logic of competition between brands. According to Elena Ermakovishna, at the same time, they strengthen, first of all, those companies that are initially focused on a mass audience and a quick response to demand.
— At the same time, brands that build communication around a complex narrative, conceptuality, and emotional utterance find themselves in a less advantageous position. Their logic of interacting with the audience requires longer engagement and does not always fit into the algorithmic mechanics of promotion," the expert emphasizes.
Thus, digital platforms are forming a new hierarchy in the industry, where the speed of adaptation is becoming an important success factor, but it is unevenly distributed. Large international chains and mass-market companies scale their products faster due to strong analytics and advanced logistics, but their flexibility is limited by a complex organizational structure.
As Elena Ermakovishna notes, there is no clear answer to the question of who adapts faster to changes in demand.
— If we are talking about the mass market, then large chains, of course, react faster to changes in consumer demand due to more resources and advanced analytics. Local brands tend to work with specific niches and narrow communities. At the same time, the level of emotional engagement of the audience and their proximity to their customer is often higher," says the expert.
Ksenia Katysheva, a consultant on creative brand development, offers a different perspective. According to her, it is small local brands that often turn out to be more flexible in dealing with new trends. Their structure allows you to make decisions faster, launch small print runs, and quickly test new ideas without going through multi-level approvals.
Large companies, on the contrary, benefit from scale: well-developed logistics chains, access to large amounts of data, and the ability to accurately predict demand. As a result, a peculiar division of roles is formed — local brands become a laboratory for rapid experiments, while international players ensure the sustainability and scaling of successful solutions.
Marketplaces act as a link in this system. They simultaneously capture demand, accelerate the spread of successful models, and increase competition for consumer attention.
The end of the trend era or a new era
As the fashion industry accelerates under the influence of social media, marketplaces, and algorithms, another shift is becoming more apparent — the disintegration of a single trend into multiple parallel visual realities. At the moment, a system is being formed in which different groups of consumers live in their own aesthetic and informational "bubbles".
According to Elena Ermakovishna, the industry is gradually moving away from the logic of global trends towards niche and segmentation.
— Today we are witnessing the industry's movement towards small audiences. The trend towards globalization, which dominated earlier, is gradually giving way to segmentation and niche development. This is one of the most stable and visible processes in the industry," the expert notes.
At the same time, she emphasizes, it would be an oversimplification to talk about the complete dependence of fashion on algorithms and personalized recommendations. Despite digitalization, there are still a significant number of brands within the industry that consciously distance themselves from platform logic and build communication through other channels — offline spaces, screenings, cultural events and personal interaction with the audience.
The return of a request for physical experience remains an important factor. In conditions of digital overload, consumers are increasingly seeking real contact with a thing, brand, and space.
— People are still people: emotions, physical presence and the opportunity to interact directly with the product are important to them. Therefore, despite the fact that basic and understandable goods will be actively purchased through digital platforms, things with a vivid expression and a value component will continue to spread through communities, personal recommendations and offline spaces," says Elena Ermakovishna.
A similar trend is recorded by Ksenia Katysheva. According to her, today it is no longer possible to talk about the existence of a single global trend in the classical sense.
— The modern industry is moving towards fragmentation and personalization. Today, it is more correct to talk not about one global trend, but about a multitude of parallel aesthetics and micro—communities," emphasizes Ksenia Katysheva.
At the same time, major trends are also being transformed, becoming more flexible, adaptive and adapting to different audience segments and brand scales. The next stage in the development of the industry, as the expert notes, is associated with further personalization of the consumer experience. Artificial intelligence, recommendation algorithms, and user data analysis will help brands create more accurate offers for a specific person.
— The difference is that personalization will be everywhere: from discount policies and brand offers adapted to your specific appearance and figure, to artificial intelligence offers based on the history of your requests, — says Ksenia Katysheva.
Against this background, the role of the designer as the author of meanings increases. In an environment where algorithms are able to quickly reproduce existing visual solutions, the ability to create new cultural codes, aesthetic concepts, and original ideas becomes a key competitive advantage. At the same time, technology is not a substitute for creativity, but a tool for scaling it up.
As a result, the fashion industry finds itself at a point of transition. Instead of a single trend system, a multi-layered structure is being formed in which global trends, niche aesthetics, and individual algorithmic selections coexist. It is in this combination that the new reality of fashion is taking shape — no longer the era of one trend, but the era of many parallel fashion worlds.
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