The singer and songwriter Sarah de Warren has created an exclusive digital “Vegan Leather Sneaker” to celebrate the release of her debut solo single ‘Vegan Leather Sneakers’ in partnership with digital fashion items designer Bzaar Labs.
After launching more than 50 tracks in the last 18 months and with almost 2 million monthly listeners on Spotify, Sarah offered her fans the chance to get their hands on a free fan-exclusive 3D wearable “Vegan Leather Sneaker” NFT.
We sat down with Sarah to know more about her creative process and the idea behind it.
Where did the idea of “Vegan Leather Sneakers” come from?
The message behind “Vegan Leather Sneakers” is about being an individual, and embracing whatever it is that makes you different. For me, being vegan from a young age always set me apart from others and I never really fit in. It was hard when kids at school picked on me for it, but now it’s kinda funny because a bunch of them ended up becoming vegan themselves! “Vegan Leather Sneakers” was born out of my own struggle to accept my individuality before I learnt that we should all be fearless about our differences.
Tell us more about your 10 new projects. When can we expect the next one?
I’ve been writing and featuring on records for DJs for about 5 years now and I’ve worked with some of the biggest artists in the scene, Kaskade, Gareth Emery and Nicky Romero to name a few, but this is the first time I’ve actually written songs specifically for myself. In order to find my sound as a solo artist. I got together with some of my closest co-writers and ended up coming out of those sessions with 5 records that lived more in the pop/alt world.
It’s exciting to be pushing my creative boundaries into a popper sound, but it was also important to me that I stayed true to my roots in dance music and to be able to play my songs in my DJ sets, so I’m teaming up with some of my favourite labels and producers to release official dance versions of each song. The dance version of “Vegan Leather Sneakers” will be coming out on August 26th.
How did the partnership with RCRDSHP come along?
I had been brainstorming ideas for an NFT drop for a while but wasn’t sure whether to focus on utility or collectability and then a DJ friend of mine introduced me to RCRDSHP.
I’m passionate about changing the music industry for the better (current streaming models are unfair for artists and especially writers) and when I spoke to RCRDSHP I realised that the platform they are building could be a really positive solution for creatives and I wanted to work alongside them and my artist project provided the perfect opportunity to do that.
How was the process of creating your own Vegan Leather Sneaker NFT?
I was attending some events around NFT LA and I crossed paths with a company called Bzaar Labs who are a fashion software company, that enables designers to create and sell 3D wearable fashion NFTs. As soon as I told them the title of my first single, a light build went off in both our heads and we knew we needed to collaborate on a digital vegan leather sneaker.
We went back and forth with mood boards and colour schemes and they drew up some incredible designs for me. Once we had the final sneaker design, RCRDSHP incorporated it as a collectable on their platform.
For an artist like you, what advantages do you find in collaborating with a platform such as RCRDSHP?
This is my first big move as an artist, so I wanted to find a unique and fun way to thank people for their support, so we decided to give the sneaker NFT out for free to anybody who pre-saved the single.
RCRDSHP made it super easy for my existing fans to onboard and access the NFT, and they also exposed my project to their awesome community who got excited about my project on the back of the free NFT they’d received.
I’m looking forward to planning another drop with RCRDSHP where I can provide utility to the owners of my NFTs. This will be a great way to engage with the community, whilst also extracting value from the music I create.
How did your fans react to this special project?
My fans went crazy for “Vegan Leather Sneakers” and I am over the moon with how much more engaged people were with this release over my DJ collabs.
It took more effort to warm people up to the NFT side of the project, but it really helped that I was giving the collectable away as an incentive to presave the song and that RCRDSHP made it so easy to access.
Most of my fans found me through my dance features, so I am pretty sure they’ll love the dance version of “Vegan Leather Sneakers” which is coming out next!
Follow Sarah de Warren online: Soundcloud | Instagram | Facebook | Website
