Why The Soul Of GGG Collaboration Is A Luxury Industry Knockout

It was only a matter of time. The fashion industry has been one of tech’s earliest adopters. The popularity of printed garment ads in the nineteenth century launched fashion media and mass retail as we know it. From smart textiles to virtual models, fashion is interested in pushing the boundaries, redefining the status quo, and leaving the seemingly impossible in the rearview. The NFT “craze” first hit the art market a few years ago. Luxury designers quickly noted NFTs’ potential for stricter authentication, greater customer engagement, and superior added value. Cue phygitals, the next frontier for physical assets with digital aspects. The phygital concept is built on three pillars: immediacy, immersion, and interaction. That’s fashion’s favorite three I’s.

As the notion of exclusivity evolves beyond ownership to focus on experiences, we enter a new era in luxury fashion. I was thrilled to recently connect with the team behind a historic NFT fashion collaboration: Soul of Nomad, Silicon Valley’s first luxury design house. Soul of Nomad’s recent fashion collab is powered by NFT commerce company Real Items on the Polygon Network. Polygon is the leading platform for Ethereum infrastructure development set to reinvent the high end fashion tech game. The surprising creative force behind the idea is legendary boxer Gennadiy Golovkin, known to the sports world and his four million Instagram followers as GGG. 

Golovkin is one of the most decorated and popular fighters globally with the highest knockout-to-win ratios in boxing history. Marking his 21st title and upcoming return to the ring, GGG’s limited edition hoodie drop is generating buzz throughout his worldwide fanbase. The GGG monogrammed black hoodie comes with an embedded NFT linked to an individual QR code and a unique activation PIN assigned to each garment. The hoodie enables the owner to access a series of exclusive audiovisual experiences and a chance to win a one-on-one training session with GGG himself. 

“I admired the philosophy of the brand, The Journey Within, and was inspired by the athletic heritage that the hoodie represents and the versatility it offers,” says Gennadiy Golovkin. “It is an essential part of my wardrobe for any occasion, whether I am traveling, training, or spending time with my family.” 

Soul of Nomad has been a well-known secret among elite athletes such as UFC’s Khabib Nurmagomedov, NBA’s Victor Oladipo, NFL’s Russell Okung, Dallas Mavericks owner Mark Cuban, and UFC’s President Dana White. To find out more about the fascinating tech, philanthropic, and design story behind the Soul of Nomad x GGG collab, I reached out to the people who made this collaboration happen.

Athletes are not always fashion’s most intuitive choice. How did your partnership with GGG come about?

Nazym Ashina Son, CEO and Co-founder of Soul of Nomad: We wanted to start a series of collaborations with influential leaders to bring compelling purpose-driven stories. Gennadiy is a first-class role model with an amazing life journey. His persistence and dedication are an inspiration for many and reflect the central theme of the modern nomadic mindset. He inspires others to go on a journey to take on the world. We also have a mission to support youth sports programs in underfunded areas across the globe. 

Do you expect NFT technology to become a staple of luxury commerce? How would that impact the market?

David Menard, CEO of Real Items: NFTs are the future of fashion and cross-border commerce. Just like cloud computing, it will take over all industry sectors opening a new world of services and value that was never possible before. Everything ranging from luxury goods to everyday consumer products will become phygitals, because they will hold the most value throughout the product life cycle. Phygitals will ultimately enable a circular economy. Products without traceability or identity aren’t trustworthy.  

Nargiza Mashuri, COO and Co-founder of Soul of Nomad: We believe that blockchain technology is set to be one of the main drivers and components of modern luxury commerce. NFT technology itself smoothly merges exclusivity, art, and experiences into one digital token. Technology will serve as the main backbone of the authentication process and help battle counterfeited products. Our goal is to implement blockchain technology across all of our physical collections and digital services. We are proud to be among the trailblazers!  

What makes NFT an appealing proposition for non-digital, non-tech businesses? 

Chad Hugghins, Marketing Lead of Polygon Studios: An NFT can serve as a kind of certificate of authenticity and scarcity, and people like being confident that they know how scarce and valuable something they own is. Collector-types may have been the first to lean into NFTs, but the market is rapidly growing beyond just basic collecting, because we are seeing a lot of innovation around NFTs in regard to the real-life utility that they can entitle owners to. 

What drives the creative industries to embrace NFT technology beyond the unprecedented authentication guarantees?

Chad Hugghins, Marketing Lead of Polygon Studios: For instance, Dolce and Gabbana‘s NFTs granted the owner a wide range of ultra-exclusive opportunities. It energized longtime and new fans of the brand alike. Beyond fashion, the creativity and storytelling of campaigns like the WWF’s Non Fungible Animals have been great to see. They are correlating the NFT supply for ten different animals with the exact number of animals left in the wild. As more NFTs are purchased, the logo on their site becomes greener. We are having conversations about leveraging NFTs for everything from supply chain logistics to AI-powered, dynamic art executions.  We have just barely scratched the surface so far of what is possible with NFTs.

David Menard, CEO of Real Items: We are on the brink of massive migration to phygitals across all sectors, including fashion and beauty. We’ve been in the business for four years and the last thing we ever mentioned, if at all, was the fact that we use NFTs. Now that art has made NFTs mainstream, it has been incredibly easy to have those same conversations. The business world is finally ready to understand NFTs and the benefits of their solutions.

Nargiza Mashuri, COO and Co-founders: Additionally, this partnership with Real Items and Polygon is aligned with our mission to be an environmentally conscious brand. Polygon’s energy consumption is only 0.00079 TWh or about 2% of the consumption of major Proof of Work (PoW) blockchain networks, which allows us to produce NFT-backed garments (phygitals) without harming the environment and increasing our carbon footprint. 

So what is the future of fashion according to Soul of Nomad?

Nazym Ashina Son, CEO and Co-founder of Soul of Nomad: The Future of fashion lies in the customer experience which merges physical and digital worlds. For example, just the gaming industry alone opened opportunities for many fashion brands when it comes to sSkins (cosmetic add-ons that customize the look of game characters). It quickly became a staple of video games. Let’s just say, there are many amazing collaborations coming soon, so stay tuned! For now, we are happy to celebrate the greatness of Gennadiy Golovkin with our Soul of GGG drop.