Why Fortnite\u2019s overpriced Balenciaga collection is a W for gaming Epic Games \/ BalenciagaIt doesn\u2019t matter if people think gaming is cool or not, because it doesn\u2019t have to be cool. Gaming can just be gaming, and Balenciaga\u2019s Fortnite collection, all thousands upon thousands of dollars of it, is living, luxurious proof of that mantra. For years, the stereotypical image of a gamer wasn\u2019t a sexy and inspiring one. Doritos fingers, mountains of empty Mountain Dew bottles, maybe some concerns over body odor \u2014 encapsulating terms like \u201cnerd,\u201d \u201cgeek,\u201d and \u201cdweeb\u201d conjured unceremonious imagery. The American gamer was most certainly not seen as someone entrenched in haute couture, let alone represented by foremost luxury fashion houses. But, against that backdrop of cultural malaise, we now have a $725 hoodie marked with Balenciaga\u2019s logo, Fortnite\u2019s logo, and a Fortnite location (Retail Row). And, somehow, it just makes sense. Balenciaga x Fortnite Gamers might react to Balenciaga\u2019s Fortnite collection by clowning the price points. Fashionistas might wonder why such a basic logo has been slapped on, seemingly sans any design work. From $395 hats to $1,290 denim jackets, all with Fortnite\u2019s generic branding tossed on, the collection feels like an expensive version of Balenciaga basics. But minimalism is the Balenciaga way, while refusing to dress up the game\u2019s branding is a testament to where gaming culture stands and where it\u2019s going\u2026 and, apparently, where it stands is in Paris, France couture studios, and among Twitter\u2019s hottest topics. Louis Vuitton, Gucci, and the olden days of luxury gaming In the past, if a cartoony video game had wanted to collaborate with a luxury fashion house founded in 1919 San Sebastian, Spain \u2014 you can be sure it would have cost a lot of money and would not have looked like this. The designers would have begrudgingly taken inspiration from the game and produced odes to it, with the final product screaming \u201cvideo game, but make it fashion.\u201d The over-designed and over-subtle markings of Louis Vuitton\u2019s League of Legends and Gucci\u2019s 100 Thieves collections, respectively, may come to mind here. But that\u2019s not what happened with Balenciaga and Fortnite, because gaming doesn\u2019t need to be designed around or seamlessly hidden to be culturally palatable anymore. It already is. When asked about the collection, Balenciaga Creative Director Demna Gvasalia said that the relationship was born out of using Unreal Engine to showcase the Fall 2021 collection and that, \u201cfrom there, we have continued to be inspired by the creativity of Unreal and Fortnite communities.\u201d Balenciaga\u2019s respect through brutalism For Balenciaga, whose ethos has become synonymous with elevated culture, that inspiration doesn\u2019t require manipulation. If you think back to the Bernie Sanders-inspired collection, the brand took a movement and plastered it into couture at face value \u2014 without any fluff. Now, they\u2019re doing the same with Fortnite: Imprinting a social phenomenon on high fashion wares, without any concern for subtlety and perceived trendiness. Bernie\u2019s brand of discourse started as a niche political movement, Fortnite\u2019s popularity started in the world of teenage gamers. Both gained enough momentum to find a home imprinted on the homepage of the world\u2019s trendiest luxury brand. If I see someone in a \u00a3365 balenciaga fortnite t shirt I am setting fire to them pic.twitter.com\/g9AB1ZfPEC \u2014 Memeulous (@Memeulous) September 20, 2021 If gamers and the fashionable are on opposite sides of a venn diagram, the brutalist design of this collection proves their intersection has grown too wide to be ignored. Neither pole\u2019s gatekeeping diehards should like this collection. It\u2019s for the people in the middle. Each day, gaming moves from the outskirts of society toward the center, and this collaboration reflects a moment in time for that trajectory. You don\u2019t need to think it\u2019s designed well or priced appropriately \u2014 it is luxury fashion, after all. Whether ironic, ambitious, or simply an easy cash grab, the rich and the tastemakers are openly embracing Fortnite and that\u2019s a W for the gaming industry.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Why Fortnite\u2019s overpriced Balenciaga collection is a W for gaming Epic Games \/ BalenciagaIt doesn\u2019t matter if people think gaming is cool or not, because it doesn\u2019t have to be cool. Gaming can just be gaming, and Balenciaga\u2019s Fortnite collection, all thousands upon thousands of dollars of it, is living, luxurious proof of that mantra. […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-22017","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/dejan.au\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/22017","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/dejan.au\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/dejan.au\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dejan.au\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dejan.au\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=22017"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/dejan.au\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/22017\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/dejan.au\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=22017"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dejan.au\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=22017"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dejan.au\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=22017"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}