As the world emerges from the pandemic, people are adjusting to switching their sweatpants for real pants – fashion icon A$AP Rocky included.
"Get Smoooth Again" follows Rocky as he emerges from quarantine when New York announces its reopening. We see him stepping out on the bubbly streets of New York, wearing a bathrobe, dirty t-shirt, boxer shorts and worn-down slippers to re-stock on potato chips.
While everyone else is dressed to impress, the rapper looks misplaced in his lockdown look as he walks over to the corner shop. Once he’s grabbed a bag of chips, the bodega cat nudges him to pay with an app, a shopping experience that immediately switches up his look into a sharp suit, while a new, unreleased A$AP Rocky track starts playing on the store radio. The spot ends with a cameo from U.K. rapper Skepta, who enters the bodega in his lockdown look.
Cultural / Context information for the jury
Sweat pants, dirty t-shirts and worn-down slippers. Needless to say, the pandemic has had a terrible impact on the way we dress. Furthermore, the entire fashion industry has taken a huge hit as people have been waiting for the pandemic to end before updating their wardrobes.
A$AP Rocky x Klarna’s “Get Smoooth Again” is a global, integrated campaign, aimed to inspire consumers to rediscover their sense of style, after spending almost two years in fashion hibernation and pandemic lockdown looks.
Because, who better to encourage people to drop their lockdown looks than A$AP Rocky, a huge global style icon, trendsetter and fashion tastemaker, and one of the most popular American artists.
Tell the jury about the production design / art direction. You may wish to comment on choices, challenges or effects.
The art direction is a mashup of Klarna's and A$AP Rocky's worlds. With meticulous production design, we merged these two, and planted a bunch of Klarna and A$AP Rocky references, visual cues and easter eggs in the film. We placed the film in A$AP Rocky's hometown, while being inspired by films and pop culture he grew up with, to set the mood for our art direction.
A$AP Rocky was involved in the creative process, and he designed some of the products in the bodega through his creative agency AWGE, such as the chips bag, a symbol of lockdown that also holds a key part in the film's story.