Boasting extensive cultural prestige and a huge Chinese fanbase, Formula 1 is back in Shanghai after a five-year hiatus, and so is its lucrative collaboration potential for luxury brands.
Formula 1’s identity as a motorsport has taken a backseat to its reputation in pop culture. As of 2024, the event has evolved into a cross-industry phenomenon, emerging as one of the fastest-growing sports events in the world. Drivers are recognized as global tastemakers, fashion brands are collaborating on collections, and each nation’s event offers the most coveted tickets of the year.
“Sport and fashion have always gone hand in hand, but Formula 1 is positioned as the most glamorous sport in the world, with an unrivaled sense of exclusivity and heritage,” says Director of Insight at Trend Forecasting Agency WGSN, Joe McDonnell.
“These attributes translate directly to the luxury sector, and it makes sense for luxury fashion houses to take advantage and leverage the iconic identities of the teams, or increasingly think about aligning with the growing celebrity factor of the drivers.”
World champion Lewis Hamilton is often seen in the latest collections at each Grand Prix, ranging from Kim Jones’ Dior Spring 2023 sweater vest to head-to-toe black ensembles by Rick Owens. Beyond donning luxury pieces hot off the runway, the star’s solo collaborations and partnerships with various fashion brands have blurred the lines between industries.
He has served as a global ambassador for Tommy Hilfiger since 2018, and in 2022, he became the first male face of Valentino DiVa, fronting the Pink “PP” campaign. More recently, he starred in Rimowa’s Q4 2023 campaign alongside Blackpink’s Rosé and footballer Kylian Mbappé.
Assisted by factors such as the rise of streetwear and the involvement of drivers like Hamilton in the fashion and art realms, F1 is currently at the center of culture. “There isn’t an archetypal F1 fan any more. The success of Drive to Survive has accelerated the popularity of the sport and brought it to new audiences around the world. In fact, nearly 40% of fans are women, which wasn't the case until very recently,” adds McDonnell. And with all eyes on the track, average viewership doubled from 554,000 in 2018 to 1.11 million in 2023, according to ESPN.
Taking Shanghai#
Next week, F1 makes its long-awaited return to China. The Formula 1 Lenovo Chinese Grand Prix 2024 is hitting Shanghai on April 19, having not taken place in the mainland since 2019 due to the consequences of Covid-19.
Since its debut in China in 2004, the race has maintained a huge local fanbase. After F1 confirmed a series of streaming partnerships with Chinese firms Tencent, Guangdong TV, and Shanghai TV in 2018, China was named as a “key market for Formula 1” by Ian Holmes, the company’s director of media rights.
Social media engagement reflects just how adored the sport is in the mainland: On Weibo, the F1 official account has 1.79 million fans, boasting 9.33 billion reads, and #F1 has 11.88 billion reads. Meanwhile, on Xiaohongshu, #F1 has 62.9 million posts.
Collabs galore#
F1’s significant marketability in China makes it an area for collaboration that luxury cannot overlook. Canadian athletics company Lululemon seized the opportunity to name the first and only Chinese Formula 1 driver as brand ambassador in 2023: Shanghainese Gen Zer, Zhou Guanyu.
That decision has undeniably contributed to Lululemon’s blossoming reputation in China, helping it achieve a 39 percent YoY increase in sales in the country to reach global net revenue of $9.6 billion for the fiscal year 2023.
Sportswear and streetwear naturally translate into F1, especially with the recent resurgence of 1990s badge-embellished racer jackets, as well as luxury fashion’s warm embrace of sneakers and casualwear over the past decade. Cars and fashion are crossing over constantly: Porsche and cult New York fashion label Aimé Leon Dore, for example, have just collaborated for a third time on a Porsche 944 Turbo, on display at 224 Mulberry in New York.
The debut Grand Prix in Las Vegas in Q4 of 2023 spurred the likes of Mitchell & Ness, Puma, Palace, and Takashi Murakami to present collaborative merchandise-style lines. Standouts included Palace and Kappa joining forces for an Alpine F1 team capsule and Murakami working with Hamilton’s clothing brand +44 on “The Vegas Trip '' collection, featuring tees, hoodies, and accessories.
Race into luxury#
Further exemplifying how F1 is venturing beyond streetwear are the Las Vegas F1 collaborations, which stretched into the realm of luxury. For example, Japanese label Sacai’s creative director Chitose Abe designed a capsule for Mercedes AMG, in addition to creating a custom bespoke wrap to accompany the collection, and Swiss timepiece manufacturer IWC Schaffhausen collaborated with Mercedes AMG Petronas F1 Team.
And last month, fellow Swiss luxury watch manufacturer H.Moser & Cie unveiled a partnership with French F1 driver Pierre Gasly last month. On Weibo, the topic “PierreGasly” has amassed approximately 34.2 million reads.
“There is big visibility created by F1, in general, across the continents, from Asia to the US. For us, these are two very strategic markets: the US and China,” Edouard Meylan, CEO of H. Moser & Cie. tells Jing Daily. “I think F1 embraces new technology, they embrace new generations. And they used to be very masculine, but it's become really any gender.
They want to go more into luxury, they want to go more high end, they are developing their brands, also in the Middle East, in China, in the US where we have ambitions and therefore we really aligned.”
It marks the first time that H.Moser & Cie has partnered with an individual rather than a brand in its 196 years of operations, showing just how influential drivers are as ambassadors. F1 drivers are seemingly on their way to surpass footballers in terms of cultural impact and marketing potential.
As the sport returns to China, F1 should be on luxury’s radar. When Zhou joined F1 back in 2022, it fueled a passion that is now booming in the nation. As luxury car brands compete to win over China’s ever-crucial luxury consumer, there are expansive possibilities to leverage the glamorous cultural capital of motorsports.