Catwalk designers streaming their fashion shows live hits new high

By Hilary Alexander, Fashion Director Published: 10:18AM GMT 19 Feb 2010

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Blogging? Its so last week. Right now, "live" streaming of catwalk shows is steaming! In fact, its getting so hot its raising the temperature in cyberspace and models are going to have to be called "supernovas", theres so many of them rattling around up there above the Earth.

Young bloggers such as Bryanboy and Tavi Gevinson should enjoy their moment in the fashion spotlight while they can, for they are about to be eclipsed by something thats bigger than both of them the virtual front-row seat at the instant digital fashion show.

Burberry launches a fashion Avatar with global 3D spectacular London Fashion Week preview: David Koma Oscar de la Renta a/w 2010/11 collection Pure and simple at Marc Jacobs Fashion shows streamed live Alexander Wang"s "velvet revolution"

After all, who needs a short, quirky opinion from an amateur fashionista, when you can watch the entire show as it is happening and form your own opinions?

The late, great, Alexander McQueen, left more than an extraordinary design legacy; he pioneered fashion"s journey into space.

His spring/summer 2010 collection, "Platos Atlantis", streamed live to potential millions, from a hologram catwalk at the Palais Omnisport in Paris, last October, in conjunction with Nick Knights SHOWstudio.com involved the most complex arsenal of computerised "weapons" ever seen in fashion: six video cameras, plus two robot installations, which operated on motion-control technology, each equipped with a tentacle-like camera which swayed around the models every move, like a cobras head seeking its prey.

Other big name labels were quick to follow, including Burberry, which live-streamed its London Fashion Week comeback last season.

This season, live streaming is the new black. At New York Fashion Week, which finished last night, Marc Jacobs, Calvin Klein Menswear, and Naomi Campbells Fashion for Relief/Haiti, were just some of the events on offer to a worldwide viewing audience; Jacobs and Klein via their own websites, Fashion for Relief on aol.com, and other sites.

The Rodarte show by the avant-garde Mulleavy sisters, and Ralph Lauren, went out on live.showstudio.com, as did Alexander Wang, while G-Star was on its Facebook page and official website.

At London Fashion Week, which opens today, the live streaming craze has reached epidemic proportions. There are so many it is easier to count the designers who are not, than those who are, and the British Fashion Council has found it necessary to issue its first Digital Schedule.

Burberry, as previously reported on Telegraph Fashion, has raised the bar by "going Avatar" and live streaming its Burberry Prorsum collection by Christopher Bailey, in 3D, to selected locations in New York, Paris, Los Angeles, Tokyo and Dubai.

More than 40 other designers at LFW are also live streaming, including Paul Costelloe, Caroline Charles, Betty Jackson, John Rocha, Jasper Conran, Danielle Scutt, Henry Holland, Boudicca, Daks, Jaeger, Savannah and Sienna Millers Twenty8Twelve collection, and Australias Sass & Bide. Central Saint Martins MA graduates catwalk show is also on the digital agenda.

Meanwhile, in Milan, Dolce & Gabbana has announced that both its mainline show and the younger, diffusion brand, D&G, will be "live" on SmartPhones and Androide mobiles.

As they say, watch this (cyber) space...