NYFW SS26: The Real Runway Was Fashion Tech

New York Fashion Week always delivers big silhouettes and bigger headlines. But the most important shifts we felt this season weren’t on the catwalk—they were in the rooms where founders, operators, and brand leaders asked how technology will shape creativity, community, and commercial performance. Below is our field report from two standout events and our own street-level activation across Manhattan.

Vogue Business: "What Community Means in 2025" Panel

1) Vogue Business: “What Community Means in 2025” — Little Ned, NYC

A through-line of the evening: community has graduated from buzzword to operating system. Panelists stressed that meaningful, in-person experiences—backed by smart digital touchpoints—are now the engine of loyalty and sales. Metrics are evolving, too: shares and reposts are outpacing likes as stronger signals of resonance. 

Why this matters for fashion tech

• Tech should amplify human connection, not replace it. The brands winning now use data to understand what people value, then design offline moments that feel personal—and measurable.

• Online vs. offline isn’t a choice. They are “two expressions of the same community,” which raises the bar for tools that can read signals across channels and close the loop to commerce.

Prévoir’s POV: Merchandising intelligence is the connective tissue between community and commercial results—turning what customers do (not just what they like) into smarter spend, tighter buys, and less waste.

2) “Building & Scaling in Fashion Tech” — LES Rooftop at Kalei NYC

Hosted with Justworks and moderated by @thepatternmakernyc, this intimate session gathered B2B and B2C founders and operators (including leaders from Cake, LePrix, and Trove) to trade practical playbooks on team design, fundraising discipline, and go-to-market focus.

“Building & Scaling in Fashion Tech” hotsted by Justworks and moderated by @thepatternmakernyc

Signals we’re taking forward

• Teams: Hire for the “translator” roles—people who can move fluidly between product, data, and merchandising.

• Fundraising: Traction beats theatrics. Revenue quality, retention, and a crisp ICP matter more than vanity growth.

• GTM: Start narrow, solve completely, and land with undeniable ROI. Expanding use-cases is easier than rescuing a fuzzy value prop.

3) Street-Level Data: Prévoir’s NYFW Poster Drop

We also ran a guerrilla activation with our NYC-based PR partner Lindsey Fletcher and content strategist Clare Howard. We plastered the city with QR posters—some playful (“Forget great jeans, Prévoir has great data.”), others speaking to the day-to-day reality (“I live in Excel hell.”). The goal: meet merchandisers where they are, turn curiosity into demos, and convert demos into free trials.

Prévoir’s NYFW Poster Drop

What we learned

• Creative that speaks merch (“Excel hell,” “smarter merchandising”) converts.

• QR in the wild works when the offer is immediate: see a demo, start a trial.

• Brand voice ≠ boring. A wink to pop culture (yes, Sydney Sweeney x AE) earned attention without diluting our authority.

The SS26 Tech Playbook (for Merch & Ops)

1. Treat community data like an input to buy plans, not an afterthought. Events, reposts, and clienteling notes should inform attribute-level decisions (colors, silhouettes, fabrics) and OTB allocations.

2. Keep a human in the loop. Generative tools can explore options, but the commercial bar comes from your brand history and merch instincts. The future isn’t automation; it’s informed judgment.

3. Protect your IP and your data. Public, general-purpose AI introduces copyright, traceability, and bias risks. A closed-loop, fashion-specific platform mitigates these by grounding exploration in your own sales and design history.

4. Measure resonance beyond likes. Optimize to the signals that predict sell-through (shares, saves, waitlists, pre-orders), then feed them into assortment decisions.

What Prévoir Is Building for This Moment

• Data-first guardrails. We surface best sellers, sales metrics, and top-performing attributes so your team can evaluate options quickly and confidently—without exposing IP. 

• Range planning that reflects reality. Our beta helps users input a budget, selling season, and categories, then outputs recommended allocation by category, target units, and wholesale costs—tightening buys while preserving creative intent.

• Community-to-commerce loop. We’re focused on unifying signals—from clienteling to content engagement—so they inform attribute-level decisions your customer will actually buy.

The Takeaway

This NYFW made one thing clear: the next era of fashion will be built where community, creativity, and data intersect. The brands that win SS26 won’t be the ones that shout the loudest online; they’ll be the ones that listen closely, plan precisely, and use technology to make every creative choice commercially smarter.

Want to see how Prévoir turns signals into sell-through?

Book a demo or start your free trial—scan one of our posters in the wild or get in touch.