The great outdoors in wintertime captivates the imagination in so many ways. The air is crisp, the sun radiant. There’s a serene silence after fresh snowfall.
But there’s an unmistakably human element as well. Crowds flock to the slopes for gutsy pursuits like snowboarding and skiing. And when people get cold (which they inevitably do) they gather for warmth: think campfires and patio heaters, steaming cups of mulled wine and hot cocoa.
Alo Yoga wanted to capture it all.
The Los Angeles-based fashion and lifestyle brand, best known for its athleisure wear, came up with the idea for a clothing line that celebrates the spirit of winter adventure in all its various expressions. “For the 2022 holiday season, we wanted to unveil our first premium collection that is both winter performance-wear and luxury prêt-à-porter, synonymous with Aspen and apres-ski,” said Alo Yoga VP & Head of Marketing, Angelic Vendette.
Performance meets luxury
Après-ski, a term that encapsulates winter culture after (après) hitting the slopes, is unique in its blend of outdoor exertion and indoor retreat, of risk and comfort. It conjures images of log cabins and luxury spas while at the same time keeping a sense of adventure front and center.
At its core, après-ski is a social concept. Travel + Leisure magazine defines it as “the shift from leg-burning ski runs to one-too-many drinks with friends.”
“Inspired by the spirit of adventure, the outdoors, snow sports, and mountaineering, our high-end line is a true ode to Aspen both in luxury design and in fabrication,” Vendette said.
The Aspen Collection is the name Alo settled on for the collection. The title elicits images of the famed ski resort nestled in Colorado’s Roaring Fork Valley, which Alo calls “the pinnacle of winter escapades”.
The 17-piece collection combines elements of luxury wear with winter performance, featuring 3-ply cashmere styles, first rate vegan leather, and waterproof ski gaiters.
“The collection consists of 17 distinctive styles, including performance-ready ski suits, ribbed cashmere sets, floor-length faux fur jackets, and water-resistant outerwear and accessories,” Vendette said.
Rather than simply announce The Aspen Collection online, however, Alo decided to go a different route. The big reveal: day two of New York Fashion Week, where an exclusive runway presentation unveiled the limited-edition collection to eager onlookers.
Making their NFT debut
New York Fashion Week wasn’t the only trick up Alo Yoga’s sleeve.
In order to breathe more life into The Aspen Collection, the company also partnered with Digital Twin Studios, a female-led agency that helps brands and consumers understand how blockchain can enhance traditional commerce.
“We work with brands from research and ideation all the way through to strategy and execution,” said co-founder Natalie Soto-Wright. “The aim is to deliver innovative web3 products that challenge the norm.”
Soto-Wright saw an opportunity for Alo to make its first foray into web3.
“Our intention was for traditional Alo consumers to understand the benefits of holding an NFT while at the same time carrying out the transaction in a way that remained authentic to the Alo brand,” Soto-Wright said. “Alo has a massive opportunity to help make NFTs and blockchain technology become mainstream because of the way they engage and connect to their target consumers”.
After putting their heads together, the teams at Alo and Digital Twin Studios decided that the best plan of action would be to offer Aspen Collection buyers an immutable certificate of ownership verifying the rarity and authenticity of their purchase. The certificates would come in the form of NFTs that also unlock benefits, such as access to future Alo Houses and Alo Wellness Clubs–-two major focus areas as the company expands into new verticals.
“The wellness brand is clearly just getting started in this space and Alo’s luxury Aspen Collection marks a monumental moment of their web3 journey,” Soto-Wright said.
The quickest path to launch
HyperMint was selected as the best partner to execute this initiative. Had Alo decided to do it alone, they would have needed to dedicate a substantial number of hours just to get their bearings in the currently chaotic web3 landscape.
From there, the cost of hiring a team of developers would have been high, the success of implementation uncertain, and the timing impossible–there simply would have been no way to pull it off in time for New York Fashion Week.
“What’s so unique about HyperMint is that we have come up with an intuitive, no-code dashboard that significantly simplifies the infrastructure you would otherwise need to develop your web3 ideas,” said HyperMint Product Manager Bianca Pham.
Pham says the HyperMint dashboard reduces the complexity of launching an NFT collection to three simple steps:
Create an NFT collection
Create a storefront website
Launch the collection
“Voila. That’s it. You’re done.” Pham said. “All of the smart contract creation, design, management and deployment to the blockchain–we take care of that behind the scenes.”
While simplicity is at the heart of this process, HyperMint’s true speciality, according to Pham, is its scalability. “We’re able to mint NFTs at a scale that enables enterprises like Alo Yoga to implement all of their creative ideas without worrying about audience reach and operations.”
In other words, HyperMint makes easy work of these deployments. For web3 newcomers like Alo Yoga, the roughly six-month process of building a tech stack is rendered obsolete. “We effectively reduce the time and resources for any enterprise and creator to go to market from months to minutes,” Pham said.
“Our mission ultimately is to onboard the world to web3,” Pham said. “And to do that, we need to lower the barriers to entry for anyone to create and mint NFTs at scale. That’s exactly what HyperMint aims to do: to make it easy to spread value by abstracting web3 technology and tools behind the scenes.”
Learn more about The Aspen Collection
The Aspen Collection was unveiled at New York Fashion Week in an experiential presentation. The collection dropped October 19th, when items were made available for purchase at flagship stores and online.
In February 2023, any consumer who purchased an item from the collection will be able to claim their NFT. These NFTs act as a digital certificate that verifies the authenticity of the product and serves as a receipt. They also grant holders access to a personal in-store shopper at their next visit to an Alo store, as well as to future Alo Houses and Alo Wellness Clubs.
Learn more about The Aspen Collection here
Get in touch
Are you a brand, enterprise, or agency that wants to deploy NFTs at scale? Contact us to learn more about how HyperMint can help your organization.
We offer free demos of our platform and can walk you through the process from ideation to deployment. Simply answer a few questions so we can show how HyperMint can work for you. Geoffrey Lyons is Lead Writer at MoonPay
