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Image created by ReflexNY
Turn off your phone, babe—there’s a whole world out there, and it’s even bigger than you think. Recently, we explored some of the city’s chicest pop-ups, each with unforgettable elements that brought major digital fantasies onto the real-live streets of New York City.
For us, it began with Tatcha. At the #MoistureMatchup pop-up during NYFW, we spotted oversized Tatcha tubs echoing the various giant CGI products populating our social feeds, and it got us thinking. The trend blew up after Jacquemus rolled massive CGI bags onto the streets of Paris in April 2023. After the viral success of this campaign, brands like Caudalie, Rabanne, and Maybelline have since been inspired to come up with their own. We’re proud to say it was Reflex behind French jewelry bigwig Boucheron’s most recent interpretation of the viral trend. As these campaigns rack up millions of views on social media, brands are coming up with fun ways of bringing that experience to the real world.
The infamous fashion designer/singer has built her first ever beauty pop-up, and it’s a larger-than-life delight for the senses. Promoting her new unisex fragrance 21:50 Rêverie, the installation includes a dreamy soundscape and gigantic leaning flacon, as well as thousands of twinkling fairy lights. The pop-up is a great blend of masculine and feminine energy, with an overall sense of luxurious other-worldliness flowing through the space. We’re curious to see if the brand dabbles in the CGI trend, as light projections and cinematic visuals have already become a major part of 21:50’s promotion. TBD!
Located in a studio-turned-event space in Chelsea, Prada promoted their new refillable fragrance in a Virtual Flower Lab. True to its name, the pop-up offered immersive rooms filled with larger-than-life flowers, digital renderings, and creative face filters. It perfectly translated the online brand experience into a tangible –and endlessly shareable– reality. It's like a metaverse meet-up… experience-ception, if you will. While interacting with a brand online is accessible anywhere, the exclusive in-person experience adds a real sense of belonging to the brand’s community. The original Paradoxe Virtual Flower Lab was a metaverse adventure, and Prada turned it into a full-fledged pop-up, taking that online sensation IRL.
It’s clear as day: as digital stunts evolve, luxury brands are raising the bar for in-person experiences. The blend of CGI hype and real-world exclusivity is becoming a marketing mainstay, and it’s only a matter of time before the stakes get even higher.
