I’m just gonna come right out and say this, I really like the Gucci memes and I’m not even ashamed of that

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I’m just gonna come right out and say this, I really like the Gucci memes and I’m not even ashamed of that

They’re good bloody memes

Brands don’t understand millennials – it’s embarrassing but it’s true. They don’t understand why people in their twenties aren’t buying diamonds, or houses or Big Macs. They panic about this, and do stupid things to try to attract ~millennials~ to their products, and that’s how you end up with horrible phenomenons like D&G’s bogus slogan-tee “WiFi is cool!” collection or literally anything that Henry Holland has tried to do in his life.

So obviously that’s why Gucci have strangely embraced meme culture in the past few weeks.

The “collaborative meme project” is known by the hashtag #TFWGucci and encourages creatives from around the world to collaborate with the brand by creating their own memes. So far it’s had submissions from artists Amanda Charchian, Olaf Breuning and Christto & Andrew (yeah, me neither). Obviously there are problems with the whole “help us make memes” thing.

Most obvious is this: helping to make memes will not make Gucci’s products more accessible to most of the young people they’re so desperately targeting. They still don’t have the money. But that doesn’t stop it looking aesthetically pretty great, certainly less obviously handwringing than the process by which the 40-year-old fashion exec who was banging his head against a desk was forced to come up with D&G’s Primark-esque collection.

Gucci aren’t the first brand to capitalise on grassroots or internet culture, and they certainly won’t be the last, so attacking them for “appropriating” meme culture or stealing something to make it mainstream is short-sighted. At least they’re looking towards modernity even if their prices are aeons away from it. There will be more of this, the millennial pandering thing. It’ll trickle down further to our “OUT WITH DA SQUAD” cynical high street fashion and ad campaigns. There’s no escaping that. But it won’t look as good as the artists creating memes for Gucci, will it? Nah.

Anyway if you wanna see the project it’ll be presented as Baselworld (some watch and jewellery event) on March 23rd or see them here. It’s probably the glossiest way you’ll ever see memes represented.

Sorry but. It just looks cool.

@rosielanners