Men’s Fashion Week is here, and with the women’s shows set to follow on, we at The Practice have been thinking about the shape of the fashion industry when it comes to how we’ll begin viewing and purchasing the latest products. With this in mind, we’re looking forward to seeing which tech and digital trends will make an appearance over the coming months. Read on for our predictions…

Firstly, we imagine that social media will take on a greater role in luxury e-commerce, mainly on Instagram. The photo-sharing platform launched its first sponsored post late last year on fashion designer, Michael Kors’ account, generating a fair amount of leads. We have high expectations that in-feed advertising on Instagram might soon lead to click-through purchasing if demand is high enough; we’re actually quite surprised that the feature isn’t available already! With a staggering 81% of American social media users saying that purchase recommendations on social networking sites were integral to their decisions, we can’t imagine it will be long before Instagram takes note. We’ve already seen the number of fashion brands using the app increase dramatically over the past year, and success from well-seasoned labels. Victoria’s Secret and Forever 21, for instance, already have in excess of 2 million followers, while brands such as Nike and ethical clothing company Free People, use it effectively to encourage user engagement by asking followers to share their own snaps. Therefore, we think that the next lucrative step to generate further revenue is for Instagram to add links and/or a “shoppable” feature.

Aside from lead generation via Instagram, we envisage shopping through other apps to also take a hold this year, as a new wave arrive on the scene and users fully embrace the mobile experience. Amongst the most interesting new fashion e-commerce apps to appear is ASAP54, which allows you to search for any item of clothing by simply uploading a picture of it for scanning. From there, users will be able to find what they’re looking for and purchase the item in question, or simply continue shopping. Searchable categories also include brand, colour, price, item and gender, while the social side of the app allows users to follow others’ wish lists or purchases, add “likes” and comments. Finally, the great selling point of the app is that users can request help from the team of styling experts with regards to items they’re looking for, or just fashion questions in general. We think ASAP54 will certainly become a new alternative to Shopstyle! Another favourite amongst The Practice team is Fashion Kaleidoscope, which features street-style snaps from which you can purchase the items shown in the photo. And, it offers a great chance for users to act surreptitiously by secretly snapping the outfits of stylish people they see on the street, then uploading it to the app to check where the items are from!

For our final prediction, we’d love to see 3D-printed fashion on the rise, and as Fashion Month is just around the corner, might we witness some special garments on the runway this year? Already last year, model Lindsay Ellingson wore a customized 3D-printed snowflake studded with Swarovski crystals at the annual Victoria’s Secret fashion show. The design was created by architect Bradley Rothenberg and 3D printing company, Shapeways, who generated the piece inside a computer program, based on a scan of the model’s body. We’d love to see this type of technology implemented further, and with stars such as Lady Gaga and Dita Von Teese already having been photographed in 3D-printed designs, we hope to see more instances this year.

Do you agree with our digital fashion forecast for the coming year? Would you like to be able to shop through Instagram, or do you already use a host of apps for your purchases? And do you think 3D printing will become even bigger this year? We’d love to hear your thoughts, so please tweet to us @PracticeDigital and share them on our Facebook page too.