Genies conjures up an NFT fashion marketplace

The Future. Genies is making it possible for users of its digital-avatar creation tools to now outfit their virtual identities for the metaverse, thanks to its new NFT virtual fashion storefront, dubbed “The Warehouse.” By also allowing users to create their own lines and their customers to remix those lines into something new, Genies may create the first remix economy in fashion… a potential boon to female designers who make up 85% of The Warehouse’s waitlist.

The mall of the metaverse
TechCrunch reports that Genies is getting into the virtual fashion game.

• The digital avatar startup partnered with Dapper Labs to open “The Warehouse,” which will exist on the Flow blockchain.
• The virtual fashion marketplace, which has been in beta since December, is now open to everyone, letting users outfit the avatars they make on Genies with unique digital items.
• Genies will only take a 5% fee of sales — much less than the nearly 50% cut that Meta will take from its virtual fashion game.
• Only approved sellers will be able to auction off their virtual fashion lines, but the company plans to roll out that capability to all its users in the near future.

One of the first creators to see their designs hit digital shelves is fashion photographer Tati Bruening, who is famous for starting the “Make Instagram Instagram Again” movement.

Designer democracy
One of the most ingenious aspects of The Warehouse is that once the clothes are purchased, they can be customized by the owner into a new line and resold.

Because each piece is an NFT, the original designer will also get a royalty for the sales of the new piece and still own the original IP. It’s as if someone bought a Levi’s jean jacket, put a bunch of cool patches on the back, and sold it on Depop… but now Levi’s makes money off that sale again.

While other avatar startups, like Ready Player Me, are focused on creating avatars that can travel across the metaverse, Genies is focused on making sure its world is one where users want to stay. Founder and CEO Akash Nigam said that he hopes Genies will evolve into a “full-fledged social network.”