2016 has been a vintage year for collaborations between fashion retailers and big name designers, musicians and…err…sci-fi franchises. After H&M and Balmain sent the fashion world into a frenzy of near-riots in 2015, it’s no surprise that a cool collaboration became this year’s must-have.
Here are four of our favorites from 2016 so far.
Launched to much fanfare earlier this month, H&M has teamed up with French fashion brand, Kenzo for a collection that Vogue says “proves fashion can be fun.”
Finnish fashion brand, Marimekko created some iconic dresses back in the 60s and now they’ve brought their bold prints to a 21st century Target near you.
Another brand blast from the past has been given a 2016 boost with A$AP Rocky’s collaboration with iconic 90’s brand, GUESS, which includes t-shirts, jackets and, of course, jeans.
MAC Cosmetics x Star Trek
The idea of collaborating with a sci-fi franchise must have raised a few eyebrows in the MAC Cosmetics boardroom. But the makeup brand cleverly recognized Star Trek’s history of strong female characters and created a collection celebrating the look of these powerful women.
While some retail collaborations involve little more than a celebrity adding their name to the packaging, the best are the result of hundreds of hours of hard work, creative inspiration and teamwork. But creative collaboration isn’t always easy. Here are three ways to ensure your next collaborative project gets the best results from everyone on your team.
1. Minimize cat herding
Don’t expect your most creative people to be great at managing the creative process. You want them to focus on the work, not collecting feedback from multiple reviewers and chasing approvals. How can you make your creative collaboration process smoother so that their talent has more chance to shine?
2. Get out of email
A recent survey shows that less than a third of creative professionals believe that email is an effective way to collect feedback on creative projects. Using a dedicated collaboration service will keep you connected with your visual content (and free from inbox-driven distractions).
3. Don’t leave people out
Too often a project’s final approver has little insight into the creative process until the final version (not a great time to suggest changes). Working in a common digital space will give everyone on your team insight into where your project is at.
For a better collaboration experience that will bring your creative team and stakeholders together in one intuitive space to review, improve and approve visual files, check out www.hightail.com.
