EXCLUSIVE: Simkhai Takes Google’s Virtual Dress Try-on for a Twirl
Designer Jonathan Simkhai loves technology. But being among the first to take Google’s virtual apparel try-on into the world of dresses isn’t just a technical or business decision. It’s also personal — or at least familial.
The designer’s mother is the inspiration for his spring 2025 collection, but that doesn’t mean she sees herself in the fashion models who grace the runways and product photos.
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Now he can give her a tool that closes the gap.
“It’s a kismet moment,” Simkhai told WWD. “I am super excited about her being able to see a version of herself on the screen.” He’s equally enthusiastic that shoppers will be able to experience that too, in just one of myriad ways Simkhai has been expanding lately.
After a year of retail proliferation, a growing celebrity fan base and new categories, thanks to the introduction of menswear in 2023, it makes sense that the brand would branch out online as well.
“We’re always trying to be at the forefront of innovation, both in the studio and also in our customer experience, user experience, customer service — as much as we can to be at the cutting edge,” he said. “And we’re always, always, always researching and exploring, whether it be new fabrics or ways to communicate with our clients.”
That speaks to the drive and constant innovation that, for Simkhai, go hand in hand with the fashion business. It’s this spirit that often takes brands into tech territory, especially lately, with the explosive growth of artificial intelligence.
Here too, AI fuels the action.
What used to be done manually, by individually photographing different looks on a range of models, Google’s virtual try-on tool pulls off by using AI to digitally dress people. All kinds of real people, from XXS to XXXL.
These human subjects are still photographed, but then the tech generates new images of them wearing various outfits, complete with realistic physics.
“This tool allows people to look at real models…in different body shapes and sizes, and it shows you subtle and crucial details, like drapes, folds, cling stretches, so it gets a pretty accurate approach,” said Stephanie Horton, senior director of global marketing for commerce at Google.
It all makes for a rare case of welcome fakery. By giving consumers options to choose a figure they identify with, they can have a reasonable expectation of what the item will actually look like on them. At least Google users seem to think so.
According to the tech giant, virtual try-on images in search see 60 percent more high-quality views. “And as we’ve seen people use it — we have data that people are using and trying, on average, four models per product — they really are trying it out on different shapes and sizes,” added Horton.
Apparently, in the year since the tool launched, Google shoppers have been more likely to visit a brand’s site after viewing virtual try-on images.
The feature debuted last year with women’s tops before expanding into men’s tops. From both a technical and sartorial standpoint, dresses are more complex. It’s no surprise then that they would take more time.
Google and Simkhai have been quietly rolling out virtual try-ons for items in the latter’s existing catalogue. But it isn’t the only brand. In general, thousands of brands are available to virtually try-on, and hundreds of try-ons for dresses specifically are available across Boden, Staud, Sandro, Maje and, of course, Simkhai, among others.
Select dresses from the Los Angeles designer’s latest line aren’t available yet, certainly not before his Saturday show at New York Fashion Week. But the virtual try-ons will be deployed a day or two after that, alongside the opening of trunk show pre-sales of the new collection
The line, a tribute to his mother, was informed by her wedding photo. “My late grandfather had a lace mill in the ‘70s, and the fabric of the dress was made by my grandfather,” Simkhai added. “So when my my parents got engaged, my mother had asked my grandfather if he would provide his fabric from his from his mill for her dress.
“I kind of stared at this picture, and [I was] really wanting to celebrate her and but also taking a completely different spin on it.” Think plenty of lace, but modernized.
Simkhai’s other efforts to expand will also make an appearance, with the brand’s first men’s runway showing.
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