The Dematerialised and Tribute Brand’s new phygital drop challenges fashion as we know it

Today, digital fashion innovators Tribute Brand and THE DEMATERIALISED joins forces for a unique and highly contemporary drop named The Real Deal. The collaboration includes six NFTs, which originate from two garments that shapeshift in three metaphysical versions. If this sounds too progressive for your liking, just know that the digital clothes are accompanied by a real-life version for the buyer too.

The first phase is the ”past”, where the NFT is sold as a one-to-one physical garment. The garment’s online version is only available as an audio file at first but is later revealed in its visual form once physically delivered to the owner.

The second is the ”present”, materialised in a digital form. This version imitates the physical garment that been purchased but amplifies the shapes and textures that enhance the visual experience, to really get a close high-resolution look of the garment.

The third and final phase is the ”future” state. This is where you can wear the garments on your body thanks to the real-time AR skin, found in Tribute Brand’s YCY smartphone app.

The drop is just another sign of the phygital (intertwined physical and digital experiences) times that we live in, a phenomenon the fashion industry is starting to pick up on. Both Tribute Brand and THE DEMATERIALISED started to pick up speed for real during the pandemic, when fashion consumers saw the possibilities of digital ownership of garments.

— The functional aspect of fashion as we’ve always known it might seem to be slowly fading amidst digital fashion. However, in our work, what used to be defined by standard function has in fact been constructed by a blend of function and aesthetics. We enter a new version of the future, one where representation precedes and conditions the real. In digital fashion, the domain of the real connects to the represented images, and a future of simulacra remains, explains Filip Vajda and Gala Marija Vrbanic, founders of Tribute Brand. Karinna Nobbs, Co-CEO of THE DEMATERIALISED, adds to the Croatian duo’s notion.

— The craft and conceptualisation behind this drop are unrivalled, and its release will provoke debate about the current and future functions of fashion, in all its realities.

The drop is available via request here.