Givenchy's marketing problem Celebrities have power, but hype can't be manufactured

Over the past weekend, half the world's Instagram feeds have been flooded with a shower of stars wearing total looks from Givenchy's latest SS21 collection designed by Matthew Williams. A roundup consisting of Travis Scott and Kylie Jenner, J Balvin, Kate Moss, Naomi Campbell, Alton Mason, Skepta, Kaia Gerber, Kim Kardashian, Bella Hadid and all that round of well-known and lesser-known faces (which also includes Williams himself) that are part of the brand's friends & family. Resorting to mega-influencers and famous actors is now a bit of a common practice of all luxury brands but with this project we are (unfortunately) far from iconic moments such as the appearance of Adrien Brody, Willem Dafoe and Gary Oldman on the Prada catwalk, back in 2012. Givenchy's social strategy was not born with the intention of associating pop culture faces with the value system of its brand but instead has the air of a generic attention-grabbing stunt to take advantage of the more momentary and superficial aspects of celebrity marketing. There is only one problem: the hype is born, it is not created.

And after Clare Waight Keller's sleepy interregnum, Williams was supposed to restore lustre to the old house – her debut collection worked, mostly, though there was room for improvement. And this collection should have settled more in the collective unconscious before being flaunted without the slightest grace as it just happened. But, apparently, everyone who counts wears it now. We are curious to wait for the way the brand will try to top itself when the collection comes to stores: it is difficult to imagine a campaign so over-the-top as to erase the memory of this.