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“I think that that - coupled with my experience of building a brand, selling product, creating product - has informed a lot of my approach to designing metaverse spaces in the sense of, what are we doing in there? What’s the utility of it?” Fernandez was the project architect for Barneys New York’s flagship stores in San Francisco and Las Vegas. I did a lot of the Barneys stores back in the day,” he continued. “I first started designing retail stores as an architect. But even before he dove into fashion - and one day could return, he hinted - he trained as an architect and had worked on high-profile retail projects. Credit: Courtesy imageĪ self-described “hybrid-creative,” the designer has racked up notable credibility in fashion as cofounder of Number:Lab, creative director of Craft Atlantic and CFDA member. The oceanside view is the main attraction with this virtual venue. But it’s all filtered through Fernandez’s lens. Imagine a heightened fantasy version of a Pacific coast getaway, with the clean lines and minimalism that Fernandez is known for offering a balance against the dramatic cliff side views.Īrchitecture fans may note a Frank Lloyd Wright sensibility to the landscape, or a Mies van der Rohe-like spirit in the interior’s use of natural stone. Working with an architectural designer known simply as “The Line,” Fernandez fashioned a sophisticated space with beautiful views, towering columns and a swimming pool, which repeats the water theme of the surrounding ocean directly on the grounds. That may not matter to buyers drawn in by their unique interoperability - or to owners who were simply charmed by the open aesthetic and design ethos. It’s similar to buying a music disc or MP3, but not actually owning the rights to the song itself.
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Though the buyers own the NFTs, they don’t own the intellectual property. The company targeted art galleries or public spaces, such as music venues and parks, but owners can use those scenes however they wish - that is, as long as they don’t violate the NFTs’ terms.įor MetaEstates_Villa, the owner can throw parties or hang out with up to 50 friends, or use it commercially as a showroom, for business meetings, event space and other purposes, up to a limit. Last month, the company launched a 3D NFT marketplace offering metaverse scenes as well as assets for use across Decentraland, The Sandbox, Cryptovoxels and Spatial. ” But MetaMundo is working toward fully automating it. “At the moment, I would say, it’s 60 percent automated and 40 percent. “That’s the future-proofed version that you get in this NFT,” said Studholme, though he admits it doesn’t come without plenty of effort, including human intervention. In other words, current owners of its NFT environments, including Fernandez’s villas, will have more virtual worlds where they can put them over time. In addition, the platform is constantly expanding compatibility to include more file types and metaverses. Ultimately, it means MetaMundo’s platform can meet a broad range of specs - from the highest level of fidelity, as in award-winning animation and gaming, to lower fidelity environments such as Roblox and even augmented reality. Once placed in a metaverse, its specs will dictate the level of quality - and they vary quite a bit. These platforms have different specs, file types and, in the case of real estate, land or plot sizes, so it’s not a one-size-fits-all situation.įernandez’s “seed” file shows very high resolution or quality, showcasing all the details that convey luxury. They can build one digital storefront or headquarters for one environment, but they would have to build it over and over again to cover other gaming or metaverse environments. That’s a significant obstacle for brands, especially if they want to establish a universal, or at least consistent, virtual presence.
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That may change one day - it would have to, in order to form the sort of seamless, connected wonderland that Meta’s Mark Zuckerberg envisions - but for now, the metaverse remains a disjointed patchwork of different platforms, graphics and technical specifications. The approach aims to solve a fundamental issue with today’s metaverse: The virtual world is not a single place, but multiple ecosystems, most of which don’t work together.
#The sandbox green bay update#
“And because all the metadata is refreshable, as new platforms come on board, we’ll start to update those as well.” If you have land in Cryptovoxels ,” Fernandez explained to WWD. So if you have land in Decentraland, you can drop it in there. “We partnered up with MetaMundo and made that deployable-ready for all the different open-source metaverses. This flexibility comes courtesy of MetaMundo, a virtual tech platform gaining attention for its “open metaverse” approach.
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