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TREND FORECASTING REPORT AW 21/22:

A fast-paced Live Client Project with premium lifestyle brand Free People. As one of my favourite briefs throughout my degree, it enabled me to get stuck into the world of research and trend prediciton, which evidently led to seeing our predictions come to life the following year!


︎ Read the full report HERE!




“Overall, I completely agree with everything you’ve looked into, particularly with activewear -
you’ve made lots of amazing connections. My questions were all answered as you continued through the
presentation, and I really think you have hit the mark with exactly what’s going on in the market right now.”

- Jessica Murray, Entire Europe Sales Manager at Free People


The Brief:
Hoping to extend their current wholesale business, Free People must understand the international (excluding US) marketplace in which they are operating. They need to have a clear insight into the industry over the next 12-24 months (for AW21/22) in order to make informed decisions for the brand’s future.

Create a trend prediction report for AW21/22 for the two areas:

1 - FP Movement - Sustainable female activewear (including; garments, shapes, colours, fabrics, graphics, sustainable innovations).

2 - Wholesale International Growth Strategy - Instore and Digital VM (including; global locations showing growth, experience, windows, marketing opportunities etc).



The Story:
Tasked to disocver trends in the wholesale environment and digital marketplaces (including web based retail), we had to create a wholesale international growth strategy which the brand could implement.

Our final report focused on two key trend drivers: The COVID-19 Pandemic + Health & Wellbeing. We also discovered a new developing consumer which we named “The Eccentric Consumer”. This consumer is essentially a combination of both key trend drivers; they hold a new sense of liberation coming out of the pandemic lifestyle, wanting to break free after being restricted and held back from normality.

We discovered that the History and Social Cycle Theory suggests we will see a “New Roaring 20’s” post-pandemic*, since consumers will have an increased interest in a more vibrant social life, reflected through their behaviours, interests and fashion choices. Although they will be bold, social and insearch of freedom, they will also need to be eased into normality as this may be a daunting, forgotten experience. Here we will see emerging trends of comfort and protection developing to calm the new consumer and make this a fluid and comfortable transition process. The protected-eccentric trends we will see shall be driven by the need of safety and assurance; we will see trends emerge such as safe shopping experiences through advances in technology, as well as protective clothing.

We researched into activewear, visual merchandising, and the macro trend of Digital Upsurge, and whilst keeping in mind the eccentric consumer, we created moodboards and visuals to support our interesting findings.



The Skills: 


  • Researcher - I took on the digital side of retail

  • Trend Forecaster - I was able to clearly define the trends in which we will be seeing during A/W 21/22 for VM and Activewear

  • Concept Developer - I collected relatable, clear and memorable imagery to best demonstrate our findings and trend predictions