Retail in Asia

Featured

Barbie collaborates with Balmain on fashion collection and exclusive NFTs

Mattel, Inc. announced the partnership between the Barbie brand and French luxury fashion label, Balmain. Developed as a celebration of both Barbie and Balmain’s combined impact on fashion and greater culture, the two brands are launching a new global ready-to-wear fashion and accessories collection.

SEE ALSO: CHARLES & KEITH collaborates with Chinese label SHUSHU/TONG on capsule collection

The venture also marks the first time Barbie is entering the digital art world. Together, the two entities launched three NFTs of Barbie and Ken avatars. Styled in Balmain’s designs, each is accompanied by a bespoke set of Barbie-sized Balmain pieces, creating a unique digital and physical art collection.

The Barbie x Balmain ready-to-wear and accessories line takes the established aesthetic and opulence that Rousteing has built up over the past decade and filters it through a Barbie lens. From a nostalgic 1990’s-era Barbie logo to a “Barbie pink” Pantone to Barbie’s iconic packaging, Rousteing and the Balmain teams’ 50+ piece collection intertwines the toy’s signatures with the label’s hallmarks, like its marinière and Labyrinth patterns.

“As our campaign images make very clear, Barbie and Balmain are embarking upon a distinctly multicultural, inclusive and always joy-filled adventure,” said Balmain‘s Creative Director Olivier Rousteing. “For this collaboration, we are building upon the New French Style of Balmain’s most recent collections, once again showing that Balmain is inspired by the truly diverse and exciting beauty found on today’s Parisian boulevards and avenues. This collection also rejects any arbitrary gender limitations—this is an almost 100 percent unisex collection. For, just as today’s Barbie makes clear, there’s nothing holding us back anymore!”

To mark the partnership, Barbie and Balmain have launched a digital campaign, which depicted the ready-to-wear and accessories collection on Barbie avatars.

Source: Business Wire

“Together, Barbie and Balmain are creating a new chapter in the legacy of the toy and fashion industries,” said Richard Dickson, President and Chief Operating Officer of Mattel. “As a fashion house committed to innovation in unexpected and joyous ways, Balmain, under Olivier Rousteing’s creative direction, is the perfect partner to translate the iconography that is unique to Barbie into a modern iteration of digital art and physical fashion.”

SEE ALSO: Looking back at the 2021 collaborations where East meets West

Barbie x Balmain NFTs will be available exclusively through Mattel Creations, via an online auction hosted on mintNFT, while the Barbie x Balmain ready-to-wear and accessories line will be available for purchase at Balmain stores, balmain.com, Mattel Creations and retailers worldwide from 13th January.