Sotheby’s has tapped designer and CFDA chairman Thom Browne to curate its upcoming “Visions of America” auction. The auction will include 500 items across art, furniture, spirits and a collection of archival looks from American fashion designers. That collection, titled “Defining American Style,” will be created in collaboration with the CFDA.

An exhibition will run from Jan. 12 to 20, with sales to follow from Jan. 20 to 29 in New York. The “Defining American Style” collection will be auctioned online on Jan. 23.

In his role as curator, Browne created an edit highlighting nine works that he resonated with most and found to be indicative of American artistry, including Charles Willson Peale’s portrait of George Washington and Thomas Moran’s Green River, Wyoming landscape as well as Chippendale chairs and a Qing Dynasty punch bowl.

“I’m an American designer and I thought it would be interesting to really represent American art through my eyes,” said Browne.

Browne first approached Sotheby’s about a partnership shortly after his appointment as CFDA chairman in January. In May, the two announced they would collaborate on an auction, now part of the wider “Visions of America.” Proceeds from the “Defining American Style” auction, which Browne hopes to turn into an annual event, will go toward funding scholarships and mentorship for emerging designers through the CFDA Foundation.

Featuring around 30 designers from the establishment to the new guard, says Browne, the fashion auction — which has yet to be finalised — will include pieces from the red carpet, or looks that hone in on a particular designers’ approach to design. Though pieces haven’t been revealed yet, Browne said the plan is to include items well-known in fashion history, such as Diane von Fürstenberg’s first wrap dress. (Sotheby’s did not confirm whether the piece will be in the auction.)

The hope is that viewers will get a sense of the diverse stories and approaches to making fashion in America, especially at this moment, said Browne.

“There are so many talented, creative designers right now, it will be a good representation of what’s happening now in America,” said Browne.

Association with Sotheby’s will also put the fashion directly in conversation with high art, said Browne. He sees it as an extension of the work his life partner Andrew Bolton has done in elevating fashion at The Metropolitan Museum of Art as Wendy Yu curator in charge.

“[The auction is] so important, especially for American designers, who get so easily pigeonholed into just being commercial designers,” said Browne. “I want designers to really give themselves the credit of being an artist.”

While curating the fashion edit, Browne thought about what pieces represented designers’ work at the highest level — and what had the potential of attracting museum-associated buyers.

Sotheby’s believes working with Browne will help it broaden the reach and create excitement around its Americana division. Lately, auction houses have leaned more heavily into fashion — auctioning Birkin bags and sneakers — to build buzz and attract new, younger clientele.

Learn more:

Fashion’s Future at Auction Houses

Traditional auction houses like Christie’s, Sotheby’s and Philips — known for selling Warhols, Picassos and antiques — are using Birkins and Jordans to cultivate their next generation of collectors.

Influencer Emma Brooks never really worried about ageing — until she turned 20.

“I started freaking out,” she said. “I look different than I did two years ago … How am I going to look in five years?”

Though the oldest among them is only around 26, Gen-Z is already anxious about looking older. They’re opting for makeup products with anti-ageing benefits like fine-line reduction and SPF protection, and 70 percent use anti-ageing serums daily, according to intelligence firm Circana. Botox start-up Peachy said Gen-Z was its fastest-growing cohort. Prevention, rather than correction, has become the status quo. Earlier this year, in a dramatic example of the trend, a TikTok titled “Things I do to slow the aging process as a 14 year old” went viral.

The author has shared a TikTok.You will need to accept and consent to the use of cookies and similar technologies by our third-party partners (including: YouTube, Instagram or Twitter), in order to view embedded content in this article and others you may visit in future.

“This generation is taking on the skin-care routine of someone older,” said Larissa Jensen, beauty industry advisor at Circana.

Now, even when 20-somethings come into dermatologist Loretta Ciraldo’s office for other concerns like breakouts, most end up steering the conversation towards ageing (including, she said, more men).

Social media is playing a big role. Thanks to Instagram, TikTok and, of course, Zoom, people are spending more time than ever looking at their own faces. Online, they share routines aimed at “preventative ageing,” encompassing everything from applying retinoids, vitamin C and sunscreen to wearing face tape at night and getting “baby botox” to ideally prevent lines from forming in the first place. Searches and social buzz surrounding botox, dermal fillers and retinol increased 63 percent this year, said Trendalytics.

Gen-Z’s early appetite for anti-ageing beauty has created an opportunity for brands to tap into a consumer they historically haven’t considered in the category, said Rich Gersten, co-founder of True Beauty Ventures. Efficacy, fast results and cost are front of mind for the group, but there’s still much to determine about how their preferences will evolve as they grow up.

“It’s a bit of a juxtaposed generation. On the one hand, they’re about body positivity, authenticity, credibility, and then on the other side, they’re very focused on anti-ageing. They use filters and put an emphasis on perfection,” said True Beauty Ventures co-founder Cristina Nuñez. “There’s positivity on one side and fear on the other.”

Big Shifts

While Gen-X baked in oil under the sun and Millennials grew up slathered in sunscreen, Gen-Z is hyper aware and knows more about skin care, the ageing process and environmental stressors than any prior generation, said Jensen. With that, Gen-Z has given anti-ageing a wellness-centric rebrand.

Dylan Heberle, a 26-year-old consultant, for example, views his skin care as tied to health and is vigilant about sunscreen first and foremost to prevent skin cancer, with an added benefit of preventing wrinkles. He sees his nightly skin care as a habit akin to exercise.

“It ties back to the rise of all-encompassing self-care … taking better care of one’s skin and oneself,” said Judah Abraham, chief executive of Gen-Z focused incubator Slate Brands.

Gen-Z wants to slow down the ageing process, rather than correct problems later, said Diala Haykal, a Paris-based dermatologist. The age group’s popularisation of “prejuvenation” — procedures that focus on prevention — represents the most significant change in cosmetic dermatology in the past two decades, she added.

Brands are making more products to meet demand. The volume of skin care or beauty products referencing anti-ageing rose 10 percent over the past two years, according to Trendalytics. Searches for sunscreen have more than tripled, and there are nearly three times as many sunscreen products on the market today compared to three years ago. Gen-Z-focused E.l.f Beauty debuted a retinoid last year, and Bubble launched an eye cream in November.

In the wake, brands specifically tailored to young skin are cropping up, including Btwn, a skin-care label based on the idea that teen skin is not adult skin, and Indu, a teen skin and makeup brand by Feelunique co-founders Aaron Chatterly and Richard Schiessl with a list of no-go harsh ingredients.

Gen-Z is also embracing injectables because of their immediate results. Botox, which Heberle first learned about on social media, appealed to him as a potentially more effective and less expensive replacement for fine line-erasing products. Young people being willing to come off the street and get a “tweakment” done was something you didn’t see a decade ago, said Nuñez.

Paul Nassif, a facial plastic surgeon best known for his appearances on the E! series “Botched,” said he’s seen an uptick in younger people seeking out peels, facials and occasionally a little laser. In older generations, the clientele seeking out these treatments was nearly exclusively over 40. Instead of bringing pictures of celebrities when they come for consultations, Gen-Z brings photos of themselves — with a filter on, said Nassif.

“There’s this idea of, ‘Ageing is a privilege. Let your hair go grey. Don’t get botox. Don’t do all these preventative measures.’ Yes, ageing is a privilege. But living another year is ageing. Showing wrinkles and having grey hair is not ageing to me,” said Heberle.

Tik-Tox

In any conversation about Gen-Z and ageing, it’s impossible to avoid TikTok.

The hashtag #antiageing has 7.4 billion views on the app. The aged filter, which gave users a look into the future, went viral earlier this year, garnering 24.5 million posts, including from Kylie Jenner. Solutions like Frownies (essentially, a sticker you sleep in to smooth out wrinkles), silicone anti-wrinkle pads from brands like Dermaclara, Amazon jaw-lift chin straps, face tape for “fox eyes” and radio-frequency devices like NuFace are everywhere.

Gen-Z’s candour on the app has helped fuel demand for treatments, said Carolyn Treasure, co-founder of Botox bar Peachy. When Gen-Zers get injections, they often film the process or scrunch their faces weeks apart to show how it freezes them.

“Millennials present this idealised snapshot of the world. They’re like, ‘Let me tell my friends at brunch,’” said Treasure. “Gen-Z is very into sharing their experience. [They tell me] ‘I don’t want to gate keep. I want others to know about this.’”

When they come in, they usually seem to have done a lot more research, she added.

Education, which is done primarily on social media, plays a large role in sparking interest in preventative ageing, said Jensen, with dermatologists (and high schoolers in their bedrooms) broadcasting skin-care advice to the masses.

Still, more information doesn’t always mean it’s accurate. Many young consumers come to Ciraldo with problems they think are related to ageing but are actually caused by premature use of harsh chemicals, she said. There is also not much long-term research available on the effects of these “prejuvenation” treatments on a younger demographic.

Plus, access to so much information can feel confusing and anxiety-inducing for a generation still figuring out its way in the world.

“We’re so young to be so worried about growing old,” said Brooks.

British designer Christopher Raeburn has been named Napapijri’s first global creative director. Raeburn’s first capsule collection will drop in Spring/Summer 2025, followed by a full collection in Fall/Winter 2025.

In the role, he’ll be tasked with elevating VF Corp.-owned outerwear brand’s identity and design credibility, including in sustainability. Raeburn previously worked under the VF Corp. umbrella as creative director at Timberland from 2018 to 2022.

He also operates his namesake fashion brand, Raeburn, which he launched in 2009. The Raeburn label will undergo a restructuring starting with a move out of Raeburn Lab, its design studio, atelier and store in London’s Hackney neighbourhood, according to a statement on Instagram.

”It’s been an incredible home for nearly eight years but times have changed, our needs as a business have changed and with those changes I’ll be taking time to reset, recharge and renew to consider what space the business will need going forward,” said Raeburn on Instagram.

Learn more:

Fashion Faces Massive Shortage of More Sustainable Raw Materials

Without greater commitment and investment from brands, the industry will face a 133 million-tonne shortfall in supply of lower-impact materials in 2030, according to a new report.

Lululemon Athletica Inc.’s revenue rose 24 percent year over year to $2 billion in the first quarter of fiscal 2023, ended April 31 — beating analyst estimates of $1.92 billion. Comparable store sales increased 16 percent.

Though the retailer said it remains cautious amid macroeconomic uncertainty, Lululemon raised its full year net revenue expectations, anticipating 17 percent growth for sales to fall between $9.4 and $9.5 billion — up from prior guidance of $9.31 billion and $9.41 billion. For the second quarter of 2023, the athletic wear retailer expects revenue in the range of $2.14 billion and $2.17 billion, an increase of around 15 percent. Shares rose 10 percent in extended trading.

Like many other retailers, Lululemon has seen uncertain consumer demand and growing costs that has cut into profitability. Gross profit for the quarter increased 32 percent to $1.2 billion and gross margin was up 360 basis points to 57.5 percent. On a call with investors, chief financial officer Meghan Frank chalked that growth up to lowered freight costs, which the company will continue to see throughout the year.

Frank said markdowns were in line with last year, and that the retailer has taken a stronger inventory position this year. Inventory turnover, however, remained lower than pre-pandemic levels.

“Too soon to say when we’ll move back to those levels, but that would be the goal over the longer term,” said Frank.

In April 2022, Lululemon debuted a plan to double the business from its 2021 revenue of $6.5 billion to $12.5 billion by 2026 through product innovation, expanding the men’s category, direct-to-consumer growth and market expansion.

As part of this strategy, the brand is launching new lines and adding hero products: last year it launched shoes, and it built on its popular Align leggings with an Align dress in May. In the year ahead, it will continue to build out golf and tennis collections. The company’s strong retail network has helped it stay resilient against emerging competitors like Alo Yoga.

Lululemon plans to open 50 new doors this year. Over half of those will be located internationally — mostly in China, where the brand has set big expectations.

The Chinese athletics landscape represents a huge opportunity for brands, but also a challenge, especially as homegrown brands like Anta and Li Ning gain in popularity. Outside of opening stores, Lululemon is building awareness through local-focused campaigns, with ambassadors including Formula 1 driver Zhou Guanyu, who the brand brought on board in January, said chief executive Calvin McDonald.

Strong growth in China buoyed results: revenue in the region was up 79 percent. Total net revenue abroad increased 60 percent compared to 17 percent in North America.

Elsewhere, the brand has been looking to find inroads with new consumers. It debuted a membership program “Lululemon Essential,” alongside a new app fit with workouts in October 2022. (The brand is trying to offload The Mirror business, which is acquired for $500 million in 2020, according to Bloomberg.) In May, Lululemon hosted a viral “dupe swap,” where it offered free Align leggings to mostly Gen-Zers who brought their knock-offs to a store in Los Angeles.

“Brand awareness and consideration is low and represents a significant runway of growth and opportunity for our business,” said McDonald.

The Council of Fashion Designers of America and Vogue announced finalists for the 2023 CFDA/Vogue Fashion Fund award on Thursday.

This year’s finalists are Kim Shui, designer of her namesake brand; Who Decides War’s Everald Best and Téla D’Amore; Zankov designer Henry Zankov; 4SDesigns’ Angelo Fabricio Urrutia; Diotima’s Rachel Scott; Kozaburo’s Kozaburo Akasaka; Sam Miro, the designer behind Sam Miro Vintage; Melitta Baumeister, designer of her namesake brand and Tanner Fletcher’s Fletcher Kasell and Tanner Richie.

This year’s competition will return to its original format, where the committee awards one winner $300,000 and two runners-up $100,000. In 2021 and 2022, the CFDA/Vogue Fashion Fund gave all ten finalists funding and access to mentorship in response to difficulties brought on by the Covid-19 crisis.

“It’s so important that the world sees this new generation of American designers,” said Thom Browne, CFDA chairman. “The talent in the United States is unparalleled in regards to creativity and diversity and, moreover, truly American.”

Serving on the selection committee are Browne; Anna Wintour, Vogue editor-in-chief and global chief content officer for Condé Nast; Steven Kolb, chief executive of the CFDA; Instagram director of fashion partnerships Eva Chen; model Paloma Elsesser and others.

Though the awards are returning to their original format, “A Common Thread,” the fundraising and storytelling initiative the CFDA and Vogue launched in 2020 to support designers impacted by Covid-19, will continue to operate.

Learn more:

Tom Ford Steps Down as CFDA Chair

CEO Steven Kolb will serve as interim chair until the organisation names its next chairperson in the fall.

HommeGirls, the independent magazine and apparel brand founded by designer Thakoon Panichgul, has snagged its biggest cover star yet — Kylie Jenner.

On sale on May 4, the issue has four additional covers, starring models Emily Ratajkowski, Kiko Mizuhara, Paloma Elesser and Alek Wek. But spotlighting a star of Jenner’s magnitude — and the fact that it was her team that approached the publication first, according to creative director Jen Brill — marks the start of HommesGirls’ next stage, Panichgul said.

Since its launch in 2019, HommeGirls has gone from secret Instagram to insider-favourite magazine and online publication. But while the arrival of a new print publication is rare enough, one that’s growing and commercially successful is even more so. Its audience is still small — online, it has 30,000 unique visitors monthly; its print circulation is 90,000 — but the company is profitable, and revenue grew 85 percent year-over-year from 2021 to 2022. Those numbers are boosted by its apparel business, which sells shirts, boxers, trench coats and upcycled tees, and saw its stockists double in 2022.

On the content side, HommeGirls has built the business by focussing on a specific point-of-view — women wearing men’s or menswear-inspired clothing — and continuously signing new luxury advertisers. To date, the magazine has worked with Chanel, Nike, Calvin Klein, Ferragamo, Levi’s and Marc Jacobs Heaven. Chanel Beauty, Celine and J.Crew are sponsoring spreads in the April issue. In product, HommeGirls has slowly but intentionally grown its apparel assortment, which is now stocked at retailers like Bergdorf Goodman and Net-a-Porter.

“We defined HommeGirls so well, and so distinctly, now it’s about trying to figure out the ways in which we can kind of broaden the community,” said Panichgul.

An Answer to Trickle-Down Fashion

HommeGirls is something of a comeback engine for Panichgul, a star of 2000s fashion. After multiple attempts to reinvent his Thakoon label, including a reboot with backing from investor Silas Chou in 2016 and a 2019 team-up with DTC cashmere brand Naadam to relaunch Thakoon as a lower-price digital label. (Panichgul has since parted ways with the company, and Naadam didn’t respond to a request for comment on Thakoon’s current operations.)

Panichgul started HommeGirls as a passion project after noticing fashionable female friends using men’s clothes to create a daily uniform. It was a style sensibility he didn’t feel was getting enough attention from existing publications and retailers. The concept, he thought, was specific but still rich and expansive.

Its editorials feel off the cuff and exhibit personal style and parsed-back looks. Creative director Brill sums up the vibe as a “white Hanes T-shirt and a Chanel jacket.” Interviews often highlight creatives who embody the fluid-dressing philosophy: designer Martine Rose and French stylist Camille Bidault-Waddington in the last issue, which also featured a 16-page spread on white button-downs as a cultural force.

“We’re big believers in letting our instincts and gut drive things … Discovery is a huge part of the publication for us: new voices, new points of view; We’re relentless and obsessed when it comes to those things,” said Brill.

The magazine informs Panichgul’s edited-down clothing designs and provides a platform to showcase the clothing. Having the publication serve as a guide has helped Panichgul create simple, refined pieces and reel in overproduction. The result, he said, is clothes people want to wear with significantly less overhead than his previous businesses. Sell-throughs sit above an average of 75 percent.

“I pay attention to the community around me. [Reaching people] is not about looking at a business plan and then working your way down from projections and fake numbers … that’s a false promise,” said Panichgul.

The business model is a fit for today’s circumstances, which make it difficult for a magazine to exist on ad dollars alone. In fashion, independent brands struggle to stand out on the runway in comparison with luxury’s largest players. Brand storytelling through the magazine and its channels better fits today’s dynamic where consumers come across brands themselves online, said Panichgul.

“[Fashion] was really about runway presentations and being able to attract a handful of players, and once you did that, there was a trickle-down effect,” he said. “I just don’t think that exists anymore.”

HommeGirls Looks Ahead

Panichgul said that over the past four years, he prioritised shoring up DTC, making sure he understood his consumer and crafting a strong, identifiable storytelling style in the magazine that attracted people who already had an inherent understanding of its perspective. A huge part of that is being able to throw things at the wall and “seeing where the chips fall,” said Brill. The Kylie cover, which for some readers will be unexpected, is one example.

Now, the brand is ready to pick up the pace of growth in both content and commerce.

Panichgul wants to bolster the editorial team — adding more full-time staff and contributors — so HommeGirls can do more partnerships and explore new content models. In the last year, the company has hired a new features director, fashion director and managing director, and the masthead for Issue 9 included nearly 30 names. Already, the company has done brand-focused mini-issues, issue inserts and physical activations.

Panichgul, who didn’t take investors initially so he could firm up the vision on his own, is now open to an injection, but he’s looking for true HommeGirls believers, those who understand the business model and see its potential.

“It’s really important we pay attention to growth trajectory and seize on momentum when we can,” said Panichgul. “I want people who believe in the brand; I don’t want just money.’”

As a former style editor at Vogue and the New York Times’ T magazine, Edward Barsamian has long been acquainted with auction houses like Christie’s, Sotheby’s and Phillips. But in 2019, while working for Victoria Beckham — after she partnered with Sotheby’s to display Old Masters paintings in her Mayfair boutique and host a New York dinner — he was newly intrigued.

He signed up for houses’ newsletters, and after receiving an email about a Christie’s handbag auction mid-pandemic, Barsamian went on to snag a Ralph Lauren Ricky bag in midnight blue for a tenth of its retail value.

“I’ve done the eBay thing before … but there was something exhilarating about winning at auction,” said Barsamian. Since, he’s purchased more, including ‘90s Chanel cashmere shirts and Space Invader and Kaws sculptures, all at auction.

Barsamian is exactly the type of shopper auction houses want in its next generation of collectors. The auction house core customer is traditionally older, hovering around aged 60, said Josh Pullan, Sotheby’s head of global luxury. To bring Millennials and Gen-Z into the auction universe, houses like Christie’s and Sotheby’s are using fashion and “buy now” formats in hopes that Chanel buyers will one day become Basquiat bidders.

It’s not just at the top: fashion orders are up 84 percent year-over-year at mid-market auction app 1stDibs, which primarily sells furniture, after putting renewed focus on the category.

“Maybe first they’re buying a bag, then they’re buying a photograph that’s $10,000, then the next thing you know, they’re coming into the saleroom and participating in a live auction,” said Rachel Koffsky, Christie’s international head of handbags and accessories.

It comes at a time when fashion auctions are seeing renewed public attention, too. Joan Didion’s Celine sunglasses fetched $27,000 via an auction on online auction platform Bidsquare, and Karl Lagerfeld’s much-publicised estate brought in over $18.5 million for Sotheby’s. At Christie’s, Andre Leon Talley’s estate fetched nearly $4 million last month, after it was displayed during a buzzy fashion month showcase in Paris and a party in New York. This week, Sotheby’s announced the auction of Michael Jordan’s “Last Dance’' sneakers — predicted to sell for between $2 million and $4 million.

“[Before] you would see fashion connoisseurs and the cognoscenti clamour for that … [now] you’re seeing a wider audience come,” said Barsamian, who attended the party prior to Talley’s auction.

Though fashion categories are becoming more important to auction businesses for most, they still only make up a fraction of sales. For Christie’s, luxury (which, beyond fashion, includes cars, wine and spirits, handbags, watches and jewellery) accounted for 12 percent of total sales: $998 million of its $8.4 billion. In 2019, Sotheby’s announced its intent to make luxury half of its business. Last year, luxury made up $2.3 billion of the group’s overall $6.8 billion in sales, nearly double the size of its luxury sales in 2021. Forced to rely more on digital — the pandemic helped lay further groundwork for growth in the category: online sales accounted for two-thirds of Sotheby’s luxury business in 2022.

“[The auction business] is a big oil tanker of a revenue channel. It’s not common that we see this sort of heat in the market,” said Mattew Rubinger, 1stDibs chief commercial officer and the former Christie’s global head of marketing. “What’s really exciting is that fashion is a bit of an outlier to that story.”

Rising Luxury Demand

It was in the 2010s that houses started seeing handbags as marketing tools rather than just the “tail” tacked onto big lots. Existing handbag collectors bought in, according to Rubinger, as did newcomers and art collectors.

“Auction houses quickly realised their power,” said Sebastian Duthy, director of London-based data analysis firm Art Market Research. “We’ve seen that on steroids with social media and the noise you can produce has grown.”

Today, auction houses see the same interest that drives consumers to resale platforms like Depop and The RealReal for Tom Ford-era Gucci and Phoebe Philo-designed Celine as setting the stage for their own growth.

“The pandemic changed the way a lot of people do what we call shopping,” said Koffsky. “When they’re buying things they’re also thinking about the circular economy. ‘Is there a resale value, is this something that I could give to the next generation?’”

Consumers are increasingly looking at luxury fashion as an investment opportunity, said Federica Lovato, senior partner, EMEA fashion and luxury lead at Bain. Rising prices and product shortages in luxury have also made auction houses into a key channel for access to top-tier goods, said Lovato, adding that today, fashion is often “artified,” endowed with a similar status as a painting or sculpture.

“[People] like to show that they belong to the creative scene with the cool kids … Fear of being left out is driving it,” said Roman Kräussl, a professor of finance at University of Luxembourg and visiting fellow at Stanford University’s Hoover Institution think tank, whose research focuses on alternative investments and art.

Reaching New Audiences

Auction houses are also courting a new generation. Krussel points to the early frenzy around the NFT market as evidence that young people are craving new ways to invest. The aftershocks of the crypto crash, he theorises, could end up driving buyers to more tangible assets.

“People realised you can lose a lot,” he said. “I think a bit of a trend is to have it ... to really wear it, feel it and own it.”

Sotheby’s and Christie’s both launched streetwear divisions in 2021 and 2022, respectively. Along with accessories, it’s helping lure in young buyers: in 2022, 52 percent of Sotheby’s streetwear buyers and 33 percent of handbag and accessory buyers were under the age of 40. A strong indicator of demand, said Koffsky, luxury also has a high sell through rate of 88 percent, compared to 83 percent across Christie’s other categories.

Fashion, watches, jewellery and other wearables also represent a key aspect of houses’ expansion strategies in Asia — a region with big interest in luxury brands, and with a big potential market in its rising middle class.

Asian buyers already make up 35 percent of luxury sales for Sotheby’s and 43 percent for Christie’s. Sotheby’s is set to open a Maison in Hong Kong in 2024. Christie’s is opening a new headquarters in the city in Zaha Hadid’s Henderson Building, which will host its first year-round Asian saleroom in 2024.

To connect with these new consumers, houses are investing in their social strategies, which helps get consumers to sales, cocktail events or seminars, said Koffsky. Sotheby’s saw social engagement up 25 percent year-over-year after launching accounts on Asia’s Little Red Book and Douyin in 2022, as well as dedicated sneaker and style Instagram handles.

“At the end of the day, auction houses survive by moving a lot of products through the doors, and that’s what they will continue to do. They need to find those collectors,” said Duthy.

Still, Barsamian thinks there’s more to be done to reach plugged-in fashion consumers and accelerate business. He recommends auction houses tap more experts with built-in online audiences and lean into their archives and authority to create content.

“They’re not properly utilising their social channels and platforms in order to speak to [young, fashion conscious] audiences … there’s a huge demand for archive, you see it all over TikTok” he said.