MatPat promises to wow viewers with viral “surprises” at Creators in Fashion show

YouTube star MatPat and Style Theory host Amy Roberts opened up about their Creators in Fashion event, promising plenty of “surprises” for fans in a show that’s just the beginning of a major legacy.

Now-retired YouTube star and Game Theory founder Matthew Patrick, aka ‘MatPat,’ told me in an exclusive interview last month that one of his first major projects post-retirement would be a creator-focused fashion show highlighting influencers’ brands and products.

The show, called ‘Creators in Fashion,’ is set to take place on April 25 on the Style Theory YouTube channel, and will feature a few major creator brands like Blogilates’ POPFLEX clothing line, Simply Nailogical’s Holo Taco nail polish, and more.

I got the chance to speak with MatPat and Style Theory host Amy Roberts about the upcoming event, which aims to shine a spotlight on the budding ecosystem of influencers and their digital brands.

“I think we all collectively recognize that the creator ecosystem has evolved and matured,” MatPat told me. “No longer are we just creating videos. We’re now creating the next generation of products that don’t exist in the marketplace right now. You have headlines every day about MrBeast and Feastables or the Logan Pauls and Primes of the world, but there are so many creators out there who are doing such incredible work in all different spaces.”

“We wanted to create an event that was a platform to showcase all that amazing work that’s being done. What Creators in Fashion really stands for is, if the wider industry isn’t going to build it for us, we’re going to build it ourselves. Here’s a platform for everyone to get that spotlight, be discovered, and for you to find your new favorite clothing brand or your new favorite style.”

“We’re big fans of all the fellow creators in our space,” Roberts added. “We see how hard they’re working to create these new brands, work on these amazing pieces of apparel, makeup, nail polish and jewelry, and they never get a big, main stage moment to show off all the work that they’ve done. We really wanted to create a safe, celebratory space for all these creators to showcase the hard work and dedication that they put into these products that they’re making, and this finally let us put together.”

Both Roberts and Patrick have been working hard to organize the event, which they explained is, in essence, six separate fashion shows in one.

Roberts broke down the many details that went into the show, including finding and casting models that represent their vision, working with their selected creators to effectively showcase their products, and even coming up with special visual effects to highlight the brands being featured.

“It’s been such a ‘learn as you go’ [experience], and a little bit of figuring out how the things that I do every day in content production translate into a live event,” she explained. “And how it translates into a runway show that still has a narrative arc, and still has an exciting moment and twist like we do in all of our videos, as well as getting to learn and getting to take the lead in discussions around model castings and making sure that we’re delivering a visual message that we stand by and that really represents our community and everything altogether in one show.”

“We are the tip of the spear of six very different companies working in their own worlds, their own spaces,” MatPat added. “We are leading the charge there and making sure that we’re gathering up the physical products, making sure that the models that we’ve selected work across all six different brands and represent the visual design and the appeal that they’re looking for across all these different runway walks, making sure that their visual aesthetics and their selections of music and their backgrounds and animations and lighting and stuff is all coordinated.” 

“It literally is running six or seven different shows all as part of one event. It’s been a good step up in kind of us even becoming more mature, more polished, and more adept at more complex styles of production, because across YouTube, you don’t see this sort of collaboration happening.”

MatPat promises “surprises” for fans at Creators in Fashion show

As Roberts mentioned, the Creators in Fashion show will feature a few “surprises” and “twists” throughout the event that fans can look forward to, including digital-first reveals that MatPat promises will get viewers “excited.”

“It’s not just a bunch of clothes on the runway, but there are going to be moments that really bring you back in that you’re gonna want to clip and share, and that are going to be memorable and get people talking,” he said. “That’s the hope across the board, is instead of this being a new thing that people are still trying to wrap their heads around, it’s like, ‘This is something that I’m looking forward to every year that I want to participate in, and that I want to be a part of moving forward.'”

As Mat said, this is just the start of an event that both he and Roberts aim to make a yearly celebration of the creator space that fans can get excited about year over year.

“I envisioned this as ‘year one’ of a regular event in the digital video space, where it’s a place to open the doors to more creators moving forward to make it a longer event, and for it to really be a platform-wide event that is happening every single year,” he told me. “Year one, we’re setting a good benchmark of six lines and six independent fashion runways. That is a lot to put together. It’s like designing six little independent, mini live streams all as one large event.”

“It’s biting off a lot, and I think at this point, we’ve kind of mapped out the playbook. We have an understanding of how to do it. From here, we can kind of scale it out and make it larger and larger as years go on. But as far as I see it, Fashion Week has existed for a long time, and there’s no reason why this shouldn’t be the Fashion Week for online consumers.”

MatPat opens up on future of Creators in Fashion

Creators in Fashion is a first-of-its kind event focusing solely on content creators and their unique brands — something both Mat and Roberts hopes will help bring the space into the mainstream for the benefit of influencers and their audiences.

“Our goal has always been to ease the learning curve of what it means to be a digital creator and to legitimize this space in a way that more traditional media outlets and stuff have been kind of slow to adopt,” MatPat said. “Creators in Fashion is the next step in that evolution and the next step in pioneering. ‘Hey, this space is here. These creators are here. They’re not going away, and they’re doing great work. And so, here’s kind of that next step in making a Fashion Week for digital video influencers.”

Fans can tune into the Creators in Fashion show on April 25. The pre-show will kick off at 2:30 pm PST / 5:30 pm EST, with the main event taking place at 3:00 pm PST / 6 pm EST — a show that Roberts promises will be a “wild ride full of surprises that we really feel will entertain people and keep them guessing until the very end.”