To determine the NEXT 20 Brands and the NEXT 20 Cultural Pioneers for Q1, the Highsnobiety and Lyst teams formed an advisory board of leading industry experts to consider more than 250 brands and 300 cultural pioneers.

Lyst then created bespoke algorithms to analyze over 11,000 data points indicating breakout potential. The algorithms were designed to weigh the more established next-gen brands and cultural pioneers fairly against those who are still emerging. Data considered included Google search volume, social media performance, press, blog and online discussion metrics, and, for the brands, proprietary insights from Lyst’s fashion search platform, which is used by more than 100 million shoppers a year.

Data only paints part of the picture. Therefore, the NEXT 20 Brands and NEXT 20 Cultural Pioneers that emerged from the data were then reviewed once again by our advisory board for further commentary, adding human experience and qualitative insights to finalize our rankings.

Sarah Andelman (Founder | Just an Idea)

Serge Carreira (Head of Emerging Brands | Federation de la Haute Couture et de la Mode)

Saam Emme (Fashion Business Consultant)

Leila Fataar (Founder | Platform13)

Jo-Ann Furniss (Editor and Consultant)

Julie Gilhart (President | Tomorrow Consulting. CDO | Tomorrow)

Yiling Hong (Founder | Canal Street Shanghai)

Stavros Karelis (Founder and Buying Director | Machine A)

Olga Karput (Founder | KM20)

Lulu Kennedy (Founder and Director | Fashion East)

Mitsuhiro Kubo (Founder | GR8)

Stefano Martinetto (CEO | Tomorrow)

Chris Morton (Founder | Lyst)

Christopher Morency (Editor-at-Large | Highsnobiety)

Bosse Myhr (Director of Menswear and Womenswear | Selfridges)

Mel Ottenberg (Creative Director | Interview Magazine)

Marcus Paul (Stylist and Consultant)

Ida Petersson (Buying Director | Browns Fashion)

Sam Trotman | (Consultant)

A common theme among the brands topping our list is that they cater to a generation which expects more from a luxury brand than an expensive product alone. Our algorithm gravitated towards companies with strong on- and offline communities, especially ones who have stayed remarkably consistent in their vision and growth.

Taking this quarter’s top spot in our NEXT 20 Brands list is Jacquemus, the youthful French label named after the maiden name of its founder’s mother. Already beloved by those in the know, 2020 is the year Jacquemus reaches the masses. In the past three months, Simon Porte Jacquemus has significantly grown his womenswear offering, expanded his jewelry collection, and created viral shockwaves with his hit “Chiquito” bag. His men’s line, launched in 2018, is quickly gaining traction too.

Then there’s the brand’s viral Spring/Summer 2020 collection presented in the middle of the lavender fields of Provence — boosting social mentions by more than 1300 percent — which just hit stores. It was followed this January by one of their best collections to date, featuring star models Laetitia Casta, Doutzen Kroes, Joan Smalls, and the Hadid sisters, resulting in an increase in social and online press mentions of 1116 percent, with Lyst seeing a 159 percent rise in searches for the four days following the show compared to the four days prior.

“Jacquemus just gets brighter and brighter. I also respect the fact he’s not doing collabs,” says Sarah Andelman, founder of Just An Idea and creative director of the now-closed Colette.

Jacquemus is mastering the art of community building for the digital age. By having a transparent 360 degree communication and PR strategy, creating IG-friendly products worn by a diverse audience (from Lizzo to Kylie Jenner), and having a competitive price point, he’s teaching established luxury brands much, much bigger than his own some key lessons in how to grow an audience.

Brands with strong environmental practices also reign supreme in this quarter’s NEXT 20 list. Businesses including Bode, Marine Serre, 1017 ALYX 9SM, and Miyagihidetaka are among those leading the charge, educating the industry as a whole on how to seamlessly push the boundaries of creating, marketing, and selling fashion in a more sustainable way, without shoving the message down consumers’ throats.

Others featured — including Salomon, Needles, and Arc’Teryx — are not new businesses, yet they’ve found credibility in the fashion space more recently, making them important additions to the NEXT 20 Brands list. Quite quickly, they have realized youth culture’s adoption of their respective brands has allowed them to actively implement new strategies around collaborations, core product, distribution, and messaging.

This quarter alone, Needles saw its IG following rise by 74 percent — the fastest out of all the brands in The NEXT 20 — while Salomon dropped popular collaborations with And Wander, Fumito Ganryu, and 11 by Boris Bidjan Saberi. It grew its footwear lifestyle division substantially as well, continuing to add to its popularity.

At Arc’Teryx, a new wave of celebrities sighted in the cult outerwear brand greatly boosted their brand awareness. Travis Scott wore a black Gamma MX jacket in his home, self-quarantining, and received 1.5 million likes on IG. Meanwhile, Drake and Virgil wore matching Arc’Teryx LEAF camo jackets at Nike’s annual summit. The latter would go on to include custom Arc’Teryx dresses in his Off-White™ Fall/Winter 2020 runway, resulting in social and online press mentions for the outerwear brand going up by 540 percent.

Many of the brands included in The NEXT 20 are proving there’s equity in operating an independently-owned business at a time of uncertainty, when radical transparency, unique responsive product, and having aligned values with your shoppers are all more important for survival than ever before.

The designers featured in this quarter’s NEXT 20 Cultural Pioneers ranking are interestingly under the radar in the fashion scene. They operate simultaneously within and without the traditional fashion system — much to their advantage. They all excel at controlling their narratives by reaching fans directly and by being radically transparent about their lives and endorsements of each other. They’ve found ways to authentically amass big groups of fans around the world without selling out or resorting to forced publicity.

The rapper Pop Smoke originally led the NEXT 20 Cultural Pioneers list, before his sad passing in mid February. During a pulse check just a few days before, the 20-year-old Brooklyn rap phenom — who was embraced by fashion figures like Virgil Abloh and whose second mixtape, Meet the Woo 2 was released only a few days before his death — clocked in at number one.

Pop is succeeded by the American singer and record producer Christopher Brent Wood, better known by his stage name Brent Faiyaz. His critically acclaimed second studio album Fuck the World was released in early February, peaking at number 20 on the US Billboard 200 chart. That same month, he suited up and sat front row at the New York Fashion Week shows of Prabal Gurung and Brandon Maxwell. Pyer Moss’ Spring/Summer 2020 collection, for which Faiyaz modeled, just hit stores. The 24-year-old broke through this quarter, with average monthly Google searches up 238 percent and a 57 percent follower growth on IG, on which he also has an exceptionally high engagement rate of 18.4 percent.

Faiyaz leads a meteoric pack of musicians who dominated the internet this quarter. South Korean rapper Mino, Swedish singer Snoh Aalegra, British rapper slowthai, Kanye West-collaborator 070 Shake, and American rappers Tierra Whack and Lil Baby have all pushed the industry’s perception of interdisciplinary stardom forward as a whole.

And it’s paying off. This year, Mino has been Googled 12,100 times a month, while slowthai — whose Russian girlfriend KATERINA also appears on this list — has this quarter’s highest IG follower engagement at a staggering 28.5 percent. Snoh Aalegra, now based in Los Angeles, saw an uptick of 112 percent in social and online press mentions after walking Mugler’s Fall/Winter 2020 show. And Lil Baby, who with 47 entries earlier this year tied the Billboard Hot 100 records of Paul McCartney and Prince, took the top spot of most Google News results out of the list. Tierra Whack covered Teen Vogue’s March issue, while 070 Shake grew her IG following by 32 percent over the quarter after releasing Modus Vivendi, her debut studio album.

Then there are the social media stars, like TikToker Charli D’Amelio and internet sensation Rickey Thompson, whose online fame is fast turning into real life cash. This quarter, D’Amelio became the most followed person on TikTok with over 47.2 million followers, and later signed with Hollywood mega-agency UTA. The content creator would go on to become the first TikToker to star in a Super Bowl commercial as well as the first TikToker to partner with a luxury fashion house. After attending Prada’s Fall/Winter 2020 show in Milan, during which she created videos with models backstage, D’Amelio saw social and online press mentions jump up by 164 percent. Thompson also had a big quarter — he’s worked with Moncler, Calvin Klein, and American Eagle, and has surpassed 5.8 million followers on IG and 1.2 on Youtube, and is up 175 percent in average monthly Google searches.

Val Kristopher, who was born in the Philippines and resides in Manchester, doesn’t show on-schedule at any of the major fashion weeks, nor does he produce a set amount of collections per year, yet he has seen social media mentions grow by 67 percent this quarter. “Val constantly engages with his community through a well curated yet simple pipeline of content,” says Stefano Martinetto, CEO at Tomorrow London. Like Kristopher, American creative Nicole McLaughlin does not adhere to the growth plans many young designers find themselves dealing with early on. While her viral, upcycled customs remain a secret to a wider industry that’s too busy with praising the same designers, McLaughlin is creating an impressive following of her own. All of the figures included in the Next 20 Cultural Pioneers list are showing their respective industries how far they are still able to push themselves. They refute what’s expected of them, challenging themselves to look beyond merely their own discipline. It’s why we expect them to dominate the future.