In Droga5’s Vestiaire Collective campaign, the clothes become the models via puppetry

Hot off the heels of the director’s last foray into ads featuring puppets for Tre, we’re pleased to say director Andreas Nilsson is back, this time with Droga5. The newest campaign is for pre-loved designer company Vestiaire Collective and features a group of puppets made entirely and impressively from pre-loved clothes to push the brand’s new sustainability-focused mantra: Long Live Fashion. Puppets Magic is the studio behind the puppets, who play models in a tongue in cheek runway campaign film.

Long Live Fashion sees five puppets walk down the runway to increasingly exuberant cheers from the audience; each represents “different reasons people shop on [Vestiaire Collective]”, explains the release from Droga5 London. With production from Biscuit Filmworks, the film introduces characters such as Rich, a lover of big-name designer; Hunter, who has a “keen eye for vintage”; and Drops, representing buyers who love limited releases. All five puppets double as fashion friends you’re sure to have met at one point or another. In a brilliant cameo appearance, the runway is narrated by famous French fashion commentator and journalist Loïc Prigent.

To create the models, Puppets Magic used the pre-loved clothes Vestiaire Collective actually sells as fabric, dressing them in miniature outfits to emphasise the sustainable focus of the campaign. Photographer Campbell Addy lensed an outdoor, print and social campaign featuring the puppets alongside other real models to brilliant, if occasionally uncanny, effect; the images utilise type to play off classic campaign imagery.

“The campaign is classic fashion editorial chic with a playful twist,” explains Stephanie McArdle, design director at Droga5 London. “There’s a serious tone that makes it all the more fun to see puppets in the mix. The puppets were treated just like real people with real personas, each bringing their story to the shoot. They are literally the embodiment of pre-loved fashion. And also represent the diversity of the buyers and sellers that make up Vestiaire Collective. Typography, also playfully classic, nods to this idea of a collective of differences.”