- $30M+annual economic impact
- 60,000+annual attendees
- 40+Countries represented
On one level, the World of WearableArt is the most lavish catwalk show in the world. On another level, it is an art exhibition blown up to epic proportions. And on yet another level, it’s theatre at its finest; it’s as close as New Zealand gets to Broadway.
As described by The Spinoff
Defining a cinematic entry point
The homepage was designed as a theatrical opening, immediately immersing visitors in the scale and prestige of WOW. Full-bleed imagery, bold typography, and carefully paced hierarchy balance emotion with clarity, guiding users towards ticketing, show information, and competition pathways without diluting the sense of spectacle.
Translating live spectacle into digital form
Show pages were crafted to echo the experience of being inside the theatre itself. Fullscreen layouts, restrained motion, and minimal interface elements allow garments, performers, and lighting to take centre stage, while still delivering essential information that supports ticket discovery and purchase.
Preserving WOW’s creative legacy
The Wearable Art Archive transforms decades of WOW history into a living digital collection. Award-winning garments are presented alongside designer profiles, section themes, and accolades, creating long-term value for designers, fans, educators, and media, while strengthening the site’s depth, search visibility, and cultural relevance.
Simplifying a complex global competition journey
Entering WOW is a detailed, multi-stage process involving designers from around the world. We restructured the competition experience to clearly guide entrants through themes, key dates, preparation, submission, and judging. Complex information is broken into digestible modules, reducing friction while supporting WOW’s growing international participation and year-round engagement.
Creating a platform for ongoing storytelling
The Content Hub supports regular publishing across designer stories, competition updates, behind-the-scenes features, and organisational news. Built for scalability, this section plays a key role in ongoing SEO improvements, audience retention, and keeping the platform active well beyond the show season.
Reflecting the scale of the people behind WOW
WOW is powered by hundreds of people, from designers and performers to models, crew, judges, and the core team. The website was designed to better reflect this collective effort, surfacing the human stories behind the show and reinforcing WOW as a global creative community rather than a single event.
Designing moments of delight throughout the experience
Moments of surprise are woven throughout the site to keep the experience feeling alive and expressive. From immersive transitions to unexpected visual details, the platform rewards exploration. Even the footer evolves dynamically, displaying a different garment on each visit to keep the experience fresh and continually celebrate WOW’s creative output.
Balancing multiple audiences with a unified experience
The platform was designed to serve multiple, distinct audiences, including first-time visitors learning what WOW is, ticket buyers planning their visit, designers entering the competition, and returning fans exploring the archive. Clear content hierarchy, intuitive pathways, and ongoing UX refinements ensure each audience can quickly find what they need without fragmenting the overall experience.
Building a platform designed to evolve
Beyond responsiveness, the site was built with longevity in mind. Clean CMS structures, flexible layouts, and performance-focused implementation allow WOW’s internal team to update content confidently, while enabling ongoing optimisation across SEO, accessibility, and conversion. The website underpins ticket sales, competition participation, and global discovery, while supporting WOW’s role as a major cultural institution and long-term contributor to Wellington’s creative economy.
