I Want It, And I Want It Now

With the advent of ‘see now, buy now’, you can have pieces you’ve spotted on the catwalk instantly. We caught up with H&M’s creative director to check out why the company has joined the trend

Waiting six months for the hot pieces we see on runways to hit the stores may increasingly become a thing of the past. Returning to its usual slot in Paris Fashion Week, H&M Studio’s show took the runway this past Wednesday, but what’s new is the fact that customers could immediately shop for all the pieces on HM.com and select stores right after the lights went out. Taking after the other big names that have opted to work on a “see now, buy now” calendar, like Burberry, Tom Ford, Ralph Lauren, Rebecca Minkoff and Tommy Hilfiger, things have never been peachier — if you’re on the consumer side. Image fatigue is apparently a real problem in this age of social media blogger reviews and live streaming: why do very core customers go through seeing the same pictures over and over again but are not able to buy the item straight away? In an exclusive interview with Muse, H&M’s head of design and creative director Pernilla Wohlfahrt tells us about the brand’s move towards this instantaneously gratifying thrill.

With the see now, buy now policy, how does this affect the production process? Does it shorten the time to develop the collection?

The Studio Collection is about presenting the most important trends and key looks of the season. It’s our interpretation of what is ‘now’ and with this collection we want to be both contemporary and forward thinking in our designs. Inspirations vary season to season, especially as we always design with our customers in mind and they are very engaged in the fashion world, so it’s often more about a story we want to tell. The H&M Studio Collection is always planned well in advance and based on extensive research by a dedicated team of designers. From a design perspective, it’s been the same overall process with ‘see now, buy now’ as with our other collections. Smaller challenges can of course pop up along the way but we relish the challenge and always try to solve it in the best possible way.

Customers these days are fickle and extremely hard to please, which resulted in the see now, buy now operation. Is it a challenge for the clothing industry to keep meeting everincreasing consumer demands?

We see increasing ‘consumer demands’ more as an opportunity to have direct communication with our customers, which can have a positive impact. We constantly listen to our customers and we do receive a great deal of feedback. Even the runway show, previously an industry-only event, is now a great opportunity to engage with customers, especially with the see now, buy now approach we choose to adopt for S/S 2017. Fashion has become truly global now, which is so exciting, and it gives us an even greater opportunity to provide fashion lovers worldwide with our collections.

With the world moving towards instantaneous gratification, do you see that as a peril, with regards to everything moving faster?

No we don’t, we are happy to see that our customers are getting increasingly interested in sustainability and we believe that in order to continue to be successful, sustainability is the only way forward.

Is see now, buy now the way of fashion in the future?

We have been monitoring this new era for the industry carefully over the past few years. It’s very exciting and the format feels natural to us. It enables us to come even closer to our customers and open up for a broader audience. We believe that see now, buy now is part of several changes that are going on in fashion right now, which we think represent the future. Closing the gap between the retail calendar and runway calendar by making the H&M Studio collection available straight from the runway will hopefully be appreciated by our customers. For us, we value the direct communication we can have with our customers through a see now, buy now runway show. I think anything that brings us closer to our customers and makes fashion even more accessible is very positive. What do you like most about this collection? Any favourite pieces? I love the relaxed vibe and how the functional details put some modern touches on the collection, such as the contrast between dreamy frills and sporty waistbands. The dresses are key, as are the matching sets of tops and trousers. While it’s always hard to choose, my favourite piece is the voluminous nylon racer-back dress — you can wear it on its own and look stunning, but you could also layer one of the ruffled blouses underneath for a very modern clash.

The H&M Studio SS17 collection will be available only at the H&M Siam Paragon branch.