Part of Decential Media’s celebration and recognition of Women’s History month

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After building a successful career in the fashion industry, Debra Langley began to give back by becoming a partner in Singapore-based venture capital firm Lyra Ventures, which invests in startups and new commerce models that reinvent our relationship with fashion retail.

Fashion is one of the largest and most profitable industries in the world, valued globally at $1.7 trillion in 2022. Yet this has come at a staggering cost to the planet. According to the Ellen MacArthur Foundation, a think tank that focuses on how to reuse and optimize materials, “Every second, the equivalent of a rubbish truck load of clothes is burnt or buried in landfill. The fashion industry is one of the major contributors of plastic microfibres entering our oceans.” It is an industry that urgently requires reinvention, and  Langley is fully on board for the effort. 

“If we don't take this opportunity to use [artificial intelligence] and web3 to really rethink the whole value chain, we are never going to get to the point of being a sustainable industry,” she said to me recently. Langley believes AI can play a significant role in reducing waste by improving production processes, predicting demand and helping fashion brands select more sustainable materials. 

“Wouldn’t you like to be able to take that shirt you don’t want anymore, if you're not going to resell it or rent it out, and go bury it in the garden and it helps grow your lemon tree?” she said. “That to me is what fashion should be about.”

She acknowledges that AI alone is not enough to solve this problem. She believes it must be combined with other solutions such as consumer education, sustainable fashion practices and an industry-wide collaborative effort to create a more sustainable and waste-free industry.

“For decades, we just made too much stuff. And why? Because we couldn't predict demand,” she said. “We were predicting too far in advance. We were making stuff, too much stuff in order to get down to a unit price that was palatable, forgetting that 50 percent of it might sit unsold in a warehouse. As a result we had all these terrible practices. Every global brand is sitting on too much inventory because of product market misalignment.” 

“This is probably the most exciting time to be in fashion in the last 100 years.” — Debra Langley

Indeed, in 2019 fast fashion retailer H&M revealed it was sitting on a staggering $4 billion of unsold inventory. And in January this year, Adidas revealed that as a result of breaking its commercial relationship with Kanye West, it was holding $1.9 billion of Yeezy sneakers in inventory which it now may not be able to sell. When you look beyond the billions of dollars and think of the number of items this represents, multiplied by the number of other brands in similar situations, the sheer scale of the problem becomes apparent. 

“We're still making too much product in factories that haven't changed since the 1950s,” Langley said. “There's pressure from the consumers, investors, and communities not to greenwash. And there's this capability now to really rethink the way we produce.” 

A still from a metaverse and fashion panel discussion moderated by Debra Langley and Odile Roujol, former CEO L'Oreal,  now VC/Founder of FAB Co-Creation Studio.  Featuring Lauren Kunze, Jan Amstutz, Mica Le John and Sumeet Shah. 

The Pandemic rapidly sped up technological innovation, especially for retail and fashion sectors. The shutdown of travel and physical retail led technologists to approach the industry during this time of crisis to offer new solutions around supply chain, virtual dressing rooms, digital fashion assets and metaverse plays. As the pandemic eased, phygital retail experiences took off as a trend, which is where both digital and actual goods are sold in tandem. Major luxury houses, sneaker companies and Zara, Forever 21 and Walmart, to mention a few, jumped onboard to experiment with these new tools, environments and experiences. 

For Langley, this triggered an evolution for fashion and made it “sexy” from a tech perspective. “A lot of talent started coming into the industry, bringing their innovative thinking and engaging with fashion people on a meaningful level,” she said. “What emerged were great examples of partnerships to bring new technologies to life and actually make proper use cases.”

What started in 2022 has quickly evolved over the course of the year. Langley is fascinated by just how quickly previously complicated tools have become simple-to-use apps and extensions that anybody can use. It’s shifted the narrative between brands and designers, creators, consumers and communities.

“This is probably the most exciting time to be in fashion in the last 100 years,” Langley said. “What's happening is we're moving towards a world of ‘everywhere commerce.’” 

She continued, “we used to talk about the consumer journey, but it's not a linear journey anymore towards a transaction. It's a series or a continuum of interactions. But the difference is that it’s the customers driving it. They are dictating how they want it, when they want it and where they want it. They are saying, ‘this is where it needs to get delivered. And this is how I will talk about it. And this is how I'll innovate from it.’ And then you add in, web3, and ownership and participation. You add in the metaverse, and you have all those things that the customer wants from brands - but it’s on steroids now.” 

Read more: NFT Fashion Takes Center Stage in Dubai’s Theater of Digital Arts

Artificial intelligence can help identify trends and what a given community wants, Langley said. “When you use AI to do that, it naturally brings you closer to the web3 conversation. These tools are encouraging more and more people to experiment,” she said.

Langley believes that this groundswell of creativity, whether it's emerging designers or communities talking about things, offers brands something to tap into that can give them an edge and lead to a direct relationship with their consumers. It’s “a whole new way of brands collaborating with the creator economy, monetized through smart contracts with royalty splits. They can co-create with their communities and then manufacture the designs that are voted on. And do this first in small batches and test sales across a limited number of stores.”

For Langley, the time is now to rethink how fashion is created, produced and experienced. For her, “The real nirvana is biodegradable fabrics that are fully recyclable and not planet damaging. Tested in virtual, demand-established, trend-established, made in small quantities or made on demand with zero waste. That's what we want. That’s the promise.”