Balenciaga’s creative director, Demna, takes his love affair with music to the next level – he’s married to music producer BFRND, after all. Who could forget the Balenciaga Loops mixes on YouTube or the earworms on Balenciaga Music, the exclusive project with Apple Music launched in 2020? For the latter, Demna teams up with cultural heavyweights to drop curated playlists and complementary merch.
Demna says: “Music is a big part of my life and is an integral part of Balenciaga’s culture. Balenciaga Music was created to share my favourite musical artists and their personal tastes and influences.” For the 2023 Balenciaga Music edition, he brings in one of his favourites: the iconic British group Archive, whose sound spans electronic, trip-hop, avant-garde and progressive rock.
Archive’s complete discography is stamped on the back of the Balenciaga Music merchandise.
The band has crafted a seven-hour-long uninterrupted playlist for the occasion. They’ve even cooked up an exclusive track, ‘Patterns,’ accessible via a limited-edition NFC chip embedded in tags sewn into the Balenciaga Music gear (imagine high-tech tees and hoodies with the band’s discography printed on the back.) In an interview with Show Studio, Archive’s Darius Keeler revealed: “It’s more old school Archive. Like our first record. A very trip-hop, down-beat style.” Curious? Grab the merch, and hit play.
