EXCLUSIVE: Drest Takes Fashion Gaming to a New Level With Immersive Luxury Experiences

LONDON — Fashion gaming app Drest has a new look — and attitude — allowing players to style a wider variety of branded clothing and accessories on models of different body types and ethnicities; prep for and “attend” exclusive events such as the Fashion Awards in London, and engage on a more intimate level with brands and seasonal collections.

The new game launches globally (with the exception of China) on Tuesday with exclusive partners Versace and the Fashion Awards, presented by Pandora.

The latest version creates a more enriching experience for gamers, and allows them to work with full collections, and hair and makeup looks created by real-world talents and brands. They can also select from a variety of global photoshoot locations and real-life events and backdrops.

Drest, which is working with more than 260 brands, also wants to create an “rvr” or real-virtual-real experience, with gamers able to win prizes inside and outside the game, hone their styling skills with each play, level up and impress their magazine “editor” with looks for virtual shoots.

The game involves interactive journeys and the ability for gamers to share their content inside and outside the game, “becoming active participants in the broader cultural conversation,” according to Drest.

The launch is the first under Drest’s new co-chief executive officer Daniel Svärd, who joined the company earlier this year.

In an interview alongside Lucy Yeomans, founder and co-CEO, Svärd said Drest refined its approach partly because people don’t want to be passive observers anymore.

“They want to become active participants, to co-create content and feel that they belong to a community,” he said, adding that Drest is taking the core experience of a fashion styling game, “and adding an editorial story line around it which is interactive, participatory and meaningful. That’s what a fashion experience is truly about.”

Svärd, who was previously at King, the Swedish video game developer and publisher behind Candy Crush Saga, said online games can no longer be “one-dimensional.” The challenge for creators now is to offer a variety of experiences, to keep people interested, playing, learning and dwelling in the game.

He said Drest’s games are not about handing users a virtual handbag and asking them to style it, but rather about giving them bigger collections, more brands and a richer context in which to work.

At the end of a game, he wants users to “walk away having learned about a collection or a brand, and about what certain items look like in various settings, and on different types of models, shapes and bodies.”

Drest’s core audience is between the ages of 18 and 29, but Svärd and Yeomans are also paying close attention to the cohort aged 29 to 35. “There’s a huge opportunity there because of our fusion of gaming and then publishing. What we’re offering is as much a content and creative experience as it is a game,” said Yeomans.

Yeomans is also putting her past experience into play with this new iteration of Drest. She said that offering a rich brand experience is key for both the gamers and the fashion companies.

“In the past, when we did anything with a brand, whether it was Gucci asking [users] to style a new campaign, or creating looks with Messika jewelry where Kate Moss was the judge, we had much higher engagement,” she said.

She added that in the gaming environment, the rewards are potentially very rich for brands. By taking a starring role in a Drest game, they can appeal to new audiences and engage in fun, fresh ways with an existing fashion-loving cohort.

She added that the new game allows for “far deeper storytelling” and a variety of brands have signed on. 

Additions include Alaïa, Balmain, Bottega Veneta, Burberry, Chloé, Fendi, Gucci, Loewe, Maison Margiela, Miu Miu, Prada and Valentino. Founder-led brands are also taking part, including Jacquemus, JW Anderson, Marine Serre, and Victoria Beckham.

The luxury jewelry and accessories names in the game include Alighieri, Amina Muadi, Cartier, Christian Louboutin and Jimmy Choo.

On Tuesday, the Fashion Awards “VIP Event” will launch. Gamers will be able to work on their looks ahead of the actual event, which takes place at Royal Albert Hall on Dec. 2. In the virtual world, they will be able to interact with Versace and the Fashion Awards organizers as they undertake creative journeys.

For the Fashion Awards VIP Event, Drest commissioned the British illustrator Alice Tait to create a bespoke London map that will take players on a journey throughout west London, from the Fashion Awards official hotel partner The Peninsula to Royal Albert Hall.

Manolo Blahnik will also join Drest’s Fashion Awards event alongside the London-based flower delivery service Flowerbx, Leica Camera and Rosewood Hotels, which will all have their products permanently featured within the game.

Yeomans, who spent her career editing glossy magazines including Harper’s Bazaar U.K. and Porter before becoming a gaming entrepreneur, said it was important that Drest offer the trappings of a luxury experience to its audience.

To wit, she’s paid close attention to “the luxury ecosystem: the hotels, the flowers, those things that make a luxury experience. That’s what we’re really focusing on. We want to create a deep immersion into that world,” she said.

Looking ahead, Yeomans said she’s talking to brands about creating more styling challenges where they can potentially use assets from destination fashion shows and events as the backdrop for immersive games.

The brands, she said, are looking into repeating destination fashion shows with Drest, “using all of the amazing elements that they created, and re-running the shows when their collections actually drop.”

Yeomans said brands could also take part in a game a few months after their special event, allowing users to experience the thrills of the real-life editors and stylists who attended the original one.

Drest plans to set challenges around fashion industry figures, such as editors, designers and celebrity stylists. Gamers will have the chance to do an edit of clothing inspired by each figure’s style. Next year, Drest will begin exploring a philanthropic events angle.

“We want Drest to be a force for good, one that really celebrates the amazing elements of this exciting world, the people, the product, and the depth of storytelling,” said Yeomans.