PFP Fashion – The Future of Digital Fashion or an Overhyped Gimmick?
What does the data say? What we should learn from traditional fashion brands? What's the right approach to creating PFP fashion?
Subscribe to a free weekly newsletter or upgrade to paid to receive exclusive access to my archived deep dives on the Fashion/Culture/Luxury NFT markets.
Glad to see McKinsey reading my work ;) In all seriousness, even if the articles have some eerily similar points by pure serendipity, it’s a reminder of how far ahead of the curve you are by reading this.
In my piece The Missing Piece of Web3 Fashion I was pointing out the lack of “runways” for Web3 Fashion. In other words, places to show off your fashion NFTs. This is especially true for digital fashion, at least for now.
In this post, I’ll be examining whether PFP fashion could be that “runway” for digital fashion.
What Is PFP Fashion?
There are two types of PFP fashion, static and dynamic. We’ve seen PFP fashion collaborations from 10KTF x Gucci PFP, Azuki x Red Bull PFP, InBetweeners x Dolce & Gabbana, HUGO x Imaginary Ones and FLUF x MNTGE. These use static wearables (wearables and PFP are combined into a single NFT).
However, Adidas and Doodles 2 Wearables, introduce a new concept of dynamic PFP fashion (the PFP and wearables are separate NFTs that you can combine and keep changing). For instance, you can combine the Adidas Virtual Gear digital fashion NFTs (pic below) with BAYC, MAYC, WAGMI United or Inhabitants (MetaHero) PFPs.
On the other hand, Doodles will incorporate dynamic PFP fashion via their upcoming Doodles 2 collection on the Flow blockchain. However, the original Doodles (on the Ethereum blockchain) can already unbundle their OG wearables using the Dooplicator and trade the Doodles 2 Wearables on the Flow blockchain (see below).
Is There Demand for Dynamic PFP Wearables?
We’ve seen the Adidas Web3 Studio members change their original PFP outfits to Adidas ones (see below), however, when it comes to the general population, the demand is still not there.
The Adidas Virtual Gear collection has seen a slight decrease in average price and a larger decrease in trading volume, after the PFP x digital fashion integration announcement on November 30th.
This indicates that even the fifth largest fashion brand in the world can’t maintain the demand for its digital fashion, yet.
The Doodles 2 Wearables’ price and volume have also declined over time. Especially volume has seen a drastic decrease since its launch in January. However, we should reserve judgment until the Doodles 2 collection (including the PFPs on Flow) launches in full sometime later this year.
Is There Demand for Static PFP Wearables?
When it comes to static wearables (i.e. clothes that can’t be changed), two interesting examples are the InBetweeners x Dolce & Gabbana Drip and the HUGO x Imaginary Ones collections. Why? Because having separate fashion and non-fashion NFT collections allows us to work out the demand for each.
InBetweeners supply: 10,800
InBetweeners x Dolce & Gabbana Drip supply: 2,000
The average price trend started out strong but has trended toward the OG collection’s average price despite Dolce & Gabbana Drip’s 5.4x lower supply.
The original InBetweeners collection has also maintained a significantly higher volume. In February it was 6x higher.
(Note: The D&G Drip collection wasn’t a purely digital fashion collectible but had a physical element as it offered perks like prints of the artwork and the ability to redeem an item from the Dolce & Gabbana vault.)
Similarly, Imaginary Ones collaborated with HUGO to create the HUGO x Imaginary Ones collection.
Imaginary Ones supply: 8,888
HUGO x Imaginary Ones supply: 1,001
Price-wise the HUGO collection has failed to stay above its parent collection despite its lower supply.
Volume-wise the HUGO collection has had only ~7% of its parent collection trading volume in March. Moreover, the original Imaginary Ones collection has seen a drastic increase in trading volume in the past few months. The HUGO collection hasn’t kept up.
Thus, generalizing from the InBetweeners x D&G and HUGO x Imaginary Ones data, there hasn’t been sustainable demand for static PFP fashion even when partnering with some of the most notable fashion brands.
Creating Context Through Avatars
One of PFP fashion’s potentials is the context it creates through gamified ecosystems. For instance, Web2 games like Fortnite, Roblox, Minecraft, World of Warcraft, etc. have strong very ecosystems. This is why the Web2 in-game skins market recently reached $50 billion.
It’s exactly because of the strength of these Web2 gaming ecosystems that their players don’t need NFTs nor understand their value. The majority hardly care whether their skins can be transferred from Fortnite to Roblox or vice versa.
Naturally, these community ecosystems aren’t as developed in Web3. In part because of this, it’s difficult for a standalone digital fashion piece to create a strong connection with the user. So how should Web3 fashion brands approach this problem?
If we look at how some of the most successful traditional fashion brands grew from small boutiques to global brands, one of their common characteristics is the effective use of avatars. Especially when these avatars are combined with the brand ethos or spirit. Which comes first probably matters less than how well they’re integrated.
Some examples include:
Givenchy → Popularized by Audrey Hepburn in Breakfast at Tiffany’s → Idea: Luxury, glamour, refinement
Breakfast at Tiffany’s Burberry → Outfitted British soldiers in WW1 and WW2 → Idea: Heritage
Old Burberry ad Gucci → Even Gucci’s turnaround in the 90s was inextricably tied to the designer Tom Ford → Idea: Youthfulness, sexiness
Tom Ford in the 90s Nike → Athletes like Michael Jordan → Idea: Victoriousness. Nike’s 1990 annual report wasn’t afraid to play into this with Michael Jordan on its cover. While its 1996 annual report linked Nike stock price to athlete performance (reminds of the PFP floor price and meta discussions on Twitter).
Cover of Nike’s 1990s Annual Report 
Excerpt from Nike’s 1996 Annual Report
Are PFPs The New Celebrities?
Much of an NFT collection’s price comes down to its narrative and public perception of luxury, influence and utility. One way to measure PFP influence status is through metrics like PFPs Per NFT, i.e. what percentage of owners use their PFPs as Twitter avatars.
If we examine the PFP collections with a digital fashion component discussed above:
Azuki = Rank #4 — PFPs Per NFT = 63.10%
NFT Inspect 10KTF Gucci Grail — Rank #63 — PFPs Per NFT = 3.65%
NFT Inspect FLUF World — Rank #441 — PFPs Per NFT = 2.13%
NFT Inspect Adidas (Wagmi United) – Rank: N/A
InBetweeners D&G Drip – Rank: N/A
HUGO x Imaginary Ones – Rank: N/A
Based on the influence graphs, PFP fashion experiments don’t seem to have added significant long-term value to PFP collections. Azuki’s ranking wasn’t affected by the Red Bull jacket announcement in mid-November, FLUF has had a consistently bad ranking while the other collections aren’t even ranked. The one exception was the 10KTF Gucci Grail collection (not pictured) which was ranked 9th based on the Unique PFPs metric at its peak in March 2022. However, the hype has died down since. This could be attributed to the fact that it was minted as a brand new collection in collaboration with already-established PFP collections, sparking some additional interest.
So far it seems brands have benefitted more from PFP collaborations than PFP collections have from brands. This is especially true if we look at the Adidas Into the Metaverse and 10KTF Gucci Grail’s general performance. On the other hand, Nike is by far the most notable (and maybe the only) brand to bring added value to a PFP collection. However, we have to remember that RTFKT was already a relatively successful PFP project before the Nike acquisition.
In summary, entire fashion brands tied their identities to select PFPs, while PFP volumes, prices or influence haven’t generally been affected by Web2 brand infusions. However, it’s still early and I think there’s room for PFP x digital fashion crossovers IF done the right way.
The Right Way?
There are interesting ways fashion brands can collaborate with NFT projects. One example is the Gucci x 10KTF Stockroom collection. The Gucci Vault Material seems to be highly valued by the holders. While not the most popular crafting item, it comes in at fourth and has one of the larger market caps of the materials. While 10KTF Stockroom isn’t a PFP project collection per se, it may dress PFPs in the future.
Another interesting experiment with PFP x fashion is conducted by RSTLSS. Its focus is digiphysical wearables, but its new collection with CrypToadz plays with the idea of interchangeability between a garment and a PFP. The collection’s future is still shrouded in mystery but should be an interesting one to follow.
Community-Created Digital Fashion
Digital wearables have the potential to unlock a new class of digital creators. We’ve seen Top Down (permissioned) and UGC models (semi-open) wearable creation models. However, Web3 has the potential to unlock the free-for-all model in a new way.
One project that’s betting on this new class of creators is RTFKT. In mid-July, RTFKT released the Clone X 3D files to its holders. While the Clone X files are for holders only, RTFKT has released free-for-all models of various ecosystem assets.
Creators can use the files to create new fashion items, 3D renders, AR filters, short movies, 3D furniture for Space Pods, anything really. People can even post commissions for digital designs in the RTFKT Discord channel. An entire community dedicated to RTFKT creators has formed out of this.
The community-created items are different from digital fashion NFTs since they’re rarely sold as NFTs (although they can be as was the case with RTFKT Creators and RTFKT Capsule Space Drip 1.2 collections). Instead, they’re used to build up the RTFKT ecosystem, create Web3 influencers and provide marketing material for the brand.
Conclusion – Going Beyond Co-Creation
I don’t think co-creation alone will create an internal digital fashion economy or the “runway” needed for these collections to thrive. New interesting solutions that gamify the ecosystem (e.g. wear to earn) have to be introduced. Avatars help.
I’ll leave you with one of my Twitter posts from May that gave a simplified example of the gamification concept.
Learn more about Web3 Fashion:
Thanks for Reading!
DM on Twitter DM email me at enquiries@nakedcollector.xyz if you want to work with me. I’m constantly looking to work with new projects.
Head to nakedcollector.xyz for the Web3 Fashion landscape.
Upgrade to the paid subscription to access The Naked Collector archives. Some of the alpha is too good to keep in the public domain. Looking at you McKinsey ;)
Author Bio
I focus on the cross-section of NFTs, crypto and fashion:
Naked Collector has been the top Web3 Fashion research/data source since 2021
6 years of experience in the crypto markets (crypto/DeFi/NFTs)
Part of 100+ NFT communities