Syky, created by a fashion veteran who held top roles at Ralph Lauren and Burberry, closed a funding round led by Seven Seven Six, the venture fund of Reddit cofounder Alexis Ohanian.
The company is the brainchild of Alice Delahunt, who was previously chief digital and content officer at Ralph Lauren and before that served as Burberry’s digital and social marketing director. In March, she left Ralph Lauren to focus on building her own digital-fashion venture.
”Some people talk about digital fashion and when it’s coming and when will it be a thing. My perspective is it’s already here,” Delahunt previously told BoF.
Syky (pronounced like “psyche”) is a blockchain-enabled platform that aims to function as a marketplace, community hub and incubator for emerging designers in digital fashion. The funding will be used to “fuel Delahunt’s vision and her mission to enable this digital-first generation to create, curate, share and trade their fashion collections,” the company said in a release.
The investment is Seven Seven Six’s first in web3 fashion.
”We invested in Alice and Syky because we believe in Alice’s vision to build the leading fashion platform and community for the next generation of designers and consumers,” Ohanian said in a statement.
Although virtual fashion is a niche market compared to its physical counterpart, young consumers who spend time in virtual environments such as Roblox and Fortnite say they value their digital appearances and are willing to spend money on virtual clothing and avatars. A number of fashion brands and entrepreneurs are betting sales of digital fashion will grow significantly in the years ahead.
Learn more:
The Executive Who Left Luxury for Digital Fashion
Alice Delahunt left her role as Ralph Lauren’s chief digital and content officer to strike out on her own and found a new web3 company in the belief that digital fashion is reaching a turning point.
