Is The Historical Model of a Concept Store Still Relevant in the future, Despite the Rise of Technology in Fashion Today? The purpose of this essay is to research in depth, the author's future practice as a creative storyteller within the modern fashion landscape. Investigating the influence of Gen Z and A on the high street. The author chose to specialise within this aspect of the industry, due to the downfall of high street stores and the rise of technology influenced by younger generations, especially with the unambiguous contrast of the metaverse and the historical model of a concept store. 'Concept is described as an abstract idea or a general notation that occurs in the mind, in speech, or thought. They are understood to be the fundamental building blocks of thoughts and beliefs. They play a significant role in all aspects of cognition.' Goguen, Joseph (2005)
The concept store sells the idea of a lifestyle to a specific target audience, which varies from store to store depending on the story or lifestyle the designers want to portray. The concept consumer is a modern shopper; a crossbreed of the online shopper, a modern technological consumer, and a department store consumer, who still enjoys going to the high street and into the physical shop to immerse themselves in a clothing culture. With many high street stores closing, it is allowing many brands (old brands to reinvent themselves and new emerging brands a chance to show something innovative) to recalculate their target market and recenter around younger generations and begin to aim marketing at them. Concept stores may be a new way forward for the new consumer emerging and may soon be the only way to survive in the modern fashion market. This essay will investigate how influential gen z is to the modern fashion high street landscape and how communicators can begin to market them toward the emergence of the metaverse. From Mary Quant's Bazaar on King's Road, being one of the first concept stores to open in 1955 to concept popup stores popping up around the globe, this essay will briefly explore how well this model worked, why it worked, and help underpin if the concept store method is still sustainable for the high street and if so, how will it keep up with the technological demands of the current generation and the emergence of the metaverse. The metaverse shows an important evolution of fashion communication and the progression of the concept store. This development will need to be carried forward as new consumers emerge, such as Alpha Gen, into the market, making it ever more important that concept stores find new ways to tell their story. Gen Z has led the way in creating and interpreting contemporary trends because of being exposed to the internet and social media from an early age. This has led to a hypercognitive generation, who are confident with collecting and cross-referencing multiple sources of information at once and with integrating virtual and offline experiences. Coming through a pandemic that saw global connectivity soar, it caused the fashion industry to accelerate forward in terms of how we combine technology with clothing, putting Gen Z in a greater position of power when it comes to creating and interpreting trends within the industry. Through surveys taken it has been revealed that the main characteristic of Gen z is the generation's search for the truth. They value individuality and selfexpression. Gen Z commented that I need to be free; I need to be myself, increasingly be myself, every day. With the internet, I feel much more free.
—Female respondent, 22, City of São Paulo. Francis, T and Hoefel, F. (2018) I really like things that are unisex! I think it's absurd that stores and brands split everything into "male" and "female." After all, fabric is genderless.
—Female respondent, 22, Goiânia. Francis, T and Hoefel, F. (2018)