Miu Miu Remains the Hottest Brand in Fashion as TikTok Further Shakes up Purchasing Habits
By Mark Wittmer
With its platform that brings together hundreds of online retailers in one search while utilizing special data analytics and tracking tools, Lyst offers a perspective that is uniquely poised to reflect the multiplicity and rapidity of the digital fashion age. The key to the platform’s success lies in its advanced search capabilities, which enable shoppers to search on the site in a way that actually makes sense for the user. Deep AI and machine learning advancements enable users to find products by entering search terms like “Kardashian dress” or “ballet-core,” rather than relying on the pre-tagged keywords that are typically used in e-commerce spaces.
This unique approach also means that we can watch the way Lyst’s luxury shoppers are responding to trends and big fashion moments in real time, and draw conclusions as to the patterns that shaped the year’s fashion economy. The 2023 Lyst annual report pointed to patterns include the continued dominance of Miu Miu and new insights on how TikTok is disrupting the pace of trends.
Index
- Miu Miu’s Reign Continues
- Loewe’s Logo Leverage
- Dilara Findikoglu: The Brand to Watch
- TikTok and the Age of Acceleration
- The End of Trends?
Miu Miu Reigns Supreme
Lyst named Miu Miu as the hottest brand of 2022, and 2023 saw it become a back-to-back title as the brand moved forward on all fronts. Prada’s younger counterpart continued to explore contemporary femininity as it delivered idiosyncratic runway collections that were nonetheless rife with covetable pieces, utterly cool ad campaigns starring the moment’s new leading ladies like Emma Corrin and Ethel Cain, and buzzy collaborations with New Balance and Church’s.
Lyst noted that the brand pushed searches for cashmere cardigans up 12 percent in the month following its “librarian-core” Fall 2023 show in March. Global demand for its ballet flats, meanwhile, increased 75 percent between March and September.
But perhaps most quantifiably impactful Miu Miu’s impact in leading the ongoing underwear-as-outerwear trend, with searches up 257 percent year-over-year in 24 hours after Corrin walked down the fall 2023 runway in a pair of gold-sequined undies worn over tights.
Loewe’s Logo Leverage
The age of logomania may be over, but there’s still something to be said about showing your loyalty – especially when it’s to a brand as artful and cool as Jonathan Anderson’s Loewe. The house’s anagram logo, a more subtle motif than an overt brand name, became the luxury symbol of the year. The popular Anagram basket bags have secured cult status, with searches up 170% year-on-year, and a halo effect on searches for dupes online.
But the Anagram’s popularity among Lyst shoppers goes beyond the typical hardware details usually reserved belts and handbags: over the past few seasons, Anderson has been showcasing Loewe’s more than usual and the design choice paid off: in April, the Anagram tank top became the hottest product of the second quarter, with searches rising 132% year-on-year, while demand for the Anagram jeans reached an all time high in June.
Dilara Findikoglu: The Brand to Watch
Dilara Findikoglu, the young designer who has made her brand the one of the most anticipated at London Fashion Week, was named as Lyst’s brand to watch. Her unique synthesis of historical feminine codes with contemporary feminism and a subtle penchant for the occult have drawn in celebrity fans like FKA Twigs, Margot Robbie, and Lady Gaga. Despite the fact that the brand sat out on fashion week this past September (a difficult yet wise move for young brands that can’t keep up with the production pace set by corporate fashion houses), Lyst still reported that year-on-year searches have increased 89%.
TikTok and the Age of Acceleration
Lyst’s data analytics capture purchasing booms in real time – and in today’s world, those booms are largely indebted to TikTok. The platform’s most in-demand sneaker was the Adidas Samba, a perennial style that this year was further revitalized through popular collaborations with the likes of Pharrell Williams, Sporty & Rich, and especially Wales Bonner. Lyst claims that the sneaker is searched on its platform every 1.7 minutes, with searches increasing 43% over the last four months – an impressive set of stats that no doubt corresponds to the sneaker’s 836M views on TikTok.
While it was similarly boosted through word-of-mouth (or phone) on TikTok, one piece also broke the luxury it-bag paradigm: Uniqlo’s Round Mini Shoulder Bag. The least expensive product to ever be featured in Lyst’s Year in Fashion, the bag racked up 119M views on TikTok, and sold out numerous times in several colorways.
Much ado was made about the stealth-wealth fits Gwyneth Paltrow wore to her court hearing in March, with many TikTokers picking apart her logo-less luxury outfits – resulting in Lyst searches for brands like The Row, Celine, and Loro Piana increasing 17%, 26%, and 25% respectively during that month.
The End of Trends?
Social media and online shopping have accelerated the pace of what’s in that by the time many people get around to noticing – including, often, traditional media – the savviest parts of the internet have already moved on. It’s said that eventually everything becomes trendy again, but when it happens so quickly, does that also mean that nothing is trendy?
Not quite – if Lyst’s data shows anything, it’s that luxury shopping has a bit of a herd mentality. But the aspect of predictability that gave us comfort as trends developed across seasons and even decades feels like a thing of the past; the next big thing can come as suddenly as a celebrity wearing something different on TikTok.
This uncertainty may be unsettling, but in a way it lifts a burden from brands and creative directors. Instead of focusing on what will play into the next big trend, they can focus on creating great work, and let the trends form organically around that. If this year’s Lyst report tells us one thing, it’s that word of mouth – mediated by TikTok as it may be – still works.