Vogue World Milan ended its run with a troupe of humanoid robots from the Chinese firm Unitree, who waved their arms and danced to a 2000s Eurodance track. The segment, titled "The Age of Intelligence," was meant to celebrate Italian craftsmanship and "the human touch" in an age of technology, but the reaction was largely negative. A video of Valentino creative director Alessandro Michele looking pained went viral, and much of the online conversation focused on the robots rather than the clothes.
The stunt is part of a broader business shift. Vogue World Milan was sponsored in part by Meta Glasses, with additional support from OpenAI, and the next edition is set for San Francisco, a city not known for fashion. Jason Johnson, founder of Culture Impact Agency, said Vogue has been courting Silicon Valley for at least a decade, noting that Jony Ive co-hosted the Met Gala in 2015. "Publications are figuring out new ways to make money and tech has money," he said. "Vogue has the cultural influence and access that those tech people want." Both sides, he argued, win in the end.
Not everyone in the tech-fashion world is impressed. Muna Ikedionwu, founder of strategy firm MKEDI, said the robots don't represent the real innovation happening at the intersection of fashion and engineering, pointing to artist duo AA Murakami's "ephemeral technology" work, including a dress of bubbles worn at this year's Met Gala. If the robot performance was meant to make the public more comfortable with fashion and technology merging, the source suggests it didn't work. Whether Vogue World San Francisco will offer a more sophisticated vision remains to be seen.