Scottish fashionistas queue overnight in Edinburgh to get their hands on H&M

“What’s most mind-boggling about these sales is that the prices are almost equivalent with mainline Balmain pieces”, Racked’s Cameron Wolf writes. For the collaboration’s launch, Rousteing and H&M promoted the hashtag #HMBalmaination. At 8 a.m. on Thursday, H&M stores across the country, including the one at 16th and Chester, will launch Balmain x H&M.

Once shoppers finally made it onto website, most items had already entirely sold out.

Balmain teamed up with H&M in May to create this more affordable line that they hope will draw in more customers.

Well, this time it’s Balmain for H&M, the collection that lets commoners dress like Kardashians in bold embroidered mini dresses, jewel-toned hip-draped miniskirts as skimpy as a satin turban, ribbon-embroidered jackets and wide jeweled belts. There are several dresses, which are similar to ones Kendall, Kylie and Hadid have worn on red carpets, now for sale for over $1,200.

While the collection appears to remain faithful to the ornate luxury of the Balmain brand, the price raises the question: for what audience is H&M designing this collection?

H&M’s latest design collaboration did not go smoothly yesterday. Each customer was allowed to buy only one of each Balmain item. However, this doesn’t come without its risks. The remaining people in the line-up were given bracelets in different colors indicating the time they could enter the store.

Other low-price clothing chains like Target, the Gap and Kohl’s have had successful partnerships with well-known, upscale designers, producing limited collections of lower-cost items for aspirational shoppers who otherwise might never be able to afford those labels.

“I’m on a very tight budget as a college student, so I don’t know if I’d buy things that were super expensive”, Roman said about the collection.

Shoppers were also out in force with many putting up posts looking to purchase pieces from the collection. But there’s a catch: You’re not getting these goods for fast-fashion prices.

Also mirroring the Alexander Wang collaboration, DiNunzio predicted that the simple Balmain logo T-shirt, at $34, would likely garner a retail value three times that.