Japan's Zozo launches bespoke fast fashion

Chris Dawson

It’s tough for a retailer to differentiate themselves online and it’s even tougher to reimagine ecommerce and address some of the common issues. That’s no more so then in fashion where high rates of returns are the norm and for every retailer there are 100 more offering relatively similar products and, in today’s world where brands are becoming less important than style, to have a truly unique offering is almost impossible.

That’s the challenge that ZOZO founder Yusaku Maezawa faced when he decided to reimagine fashion ecommerce and decided to address the challenge of sizing and ensuring a perfectly fitting garment is delivered each and every time. Committed to finding a solution that would benefit as many people around the world as possible, Maezawa began development on the ZOZOSUIT and a line of affordable, size-free clothing for men and women.

The ZOZOSUIT is a stretchy body suit covered in more than 350 white dots, each of which is unique. These dots serve as markers, which are used in a unique measuring process powered by a smartphone app. Consumers don the suit and rotate as 12 images are captured and from this the app measures your unique body shape and size. It’s this ability to capture an individual’s exact measurements that enables ZOZO to ship garments that will fit perfectly every time and in the process cutting returns in a vertical that is renowned for high returns rates.

ZOZOs proprietary algorithm processes the spacial data and triangulates a 3D rendering of your body based on where each unique white dot was captured in space. More accurate than a human tailor, measurements captured with the ZOZO measurement system are exact and unique to you. It’s effectively a home based 3D scanning of your body and ZOZO will ship a free ZOZOSUIT to anyone that wishes to sign up as a customer.

This is such a unique take on fashion that there’s really nothing else out there to compare it with. ZOZO don’t have the normal fashion problem of a consumer purchasing three different sizes of the same garment and returning two. When you shop at ZOZO, you won’t even see the option to select a size on their website or find a size tag in your clothing. At ZOZO their aim is to build a size-free world where you’ll get custom-fit clothing that feels tailor-made.