How Stores Can Define Collections Using Mannequins

Nowadays, mannequins are a statement in visual merchandising, a cost-effective marketing strategy that embodies also a reflection of the consumer’s nature. We witness an unprecedented diversity of mannequins, not only connected to composition, design, structure, but also to their usability.

The manufacture of the mannequins is increasingly transforming into a genuine form of art that goes along with the “Zeitgeist” of the fashion and art as well; shapeless mannequins, merged materials mannequins, transgender, oversized, all of them are to be found in self-respecting stores that understand the importance of investing in aesthetical layouts for enhancing the store’s visibility and brand awareness.

Making The Most Out Of Mannequins

Mannequins’ customer-friendly aspect is a fact that needs to be exploited at its highest potential because it may lead to important benefits. People enjoy seeing creativeness and originality in every attempt to create intriguing and appealing displays that makes use of mannequins. Each possible development of the mannequin’s aspect and usage can be perceived as a way to ensure a potential originality and novelty that is translated into a higher visibility and recognition among other stores.

This versatility that characterizes today’s mannequin aspect is a proof of the increasing strategies to communicate more with the customers. Fashion is not a static field, and this is the first reason why we see this reflected in the way in which apparel stores try to communicate that to the customers. Mannequins used to be o form of stereotype and the world is now focusing on erasing this idea. People are diverse, tastes are diverse. For this diversity there is this continuous struggle to come up with new ideas to state it again and again, to make people feel free with their and wear whatever they please.

Integrating Mannequins With Your Collection & Displays

When it comes to actually apply the entire ideas about diversity when crafting displays, we need to understand that the more complex our target customers and collections are, the more we need to invest in visually promoting our brand and our store. For example, every store sells XXL clothes, but not all show that to the public. Skinny mannequin window displays are everywhere, but stores started to promote this openness for the main reason of providing a better definition of their collections. This is reason for the emergence of “Realistic collections” of mannequins (very expressive human figures, faces with wrinkles and other flaws).

Mannequin usage is influenced also by the type of items a store offers and the way in which the store designer decides to create a display. For example, action mannequins are very useful when we sell sports collections and articles for teens, normal mannequins are used when we display luxury items, for their more “classical look”, but shouldn’t be used, for example, when we have a big collection and little space for display. Therefore, diverse collections are rendered by complex displays and mannequins, according to their function and type.

The use of complex mannequins isn’t only a result of a diverse collection, but also a way to improve the visibility of the store. It is a simple aftermath of the development of more complex strategies to attract customers by rendering the collections as enjoyable and aesthetically as possible.

The Secret To Defining Your Apparel Collection With Mannequins

But defining a collection of clothes or items of different types doesn’t necessary imply the fact that we need to use specific mannequins only for the sake of accuracy; by defining a collection through the use of mannequins we refer mainly to valorize it, to put it into displays along with mannequins, props and other means to improve their visibility and attract customers.

This is the main reason for the development of the so-called “the art of mannequin”, a more systematic approach towards the conversion of a simple manufacturing of mannequins into a special form of art. Mannequins have grown in aspect, going along the postmodern mindset. We see now surreal mannequins (parts of the “body” fused to objects, birds, for example), and all the mannequins reflecting human emotions and expressions.

As stated before, the choice for mannequins is given by their customer-friendly appearance, meant to render a certain personality to the items of clothing they present. An expressive mannequin is the best choice because people don’t want to see a precise inexpressive mass representing something, because nobody buys random clothes, but outfits that shape our personality. We may think from now on at mannequins used in creative displays as to something that can really shape our way of getting dressed because the era of stoned and expressionless mannequins has come to an end.