SKIMS: from headed Shopify to an enterprise Hydrogen first
First, the original skims.com on headed Shopify. Then the first enterprise brand to launch on Shopify Hydrogen. Across both storefront generations, SDG architected, built, and scaled nearly every aspect of the commerce experience. One of our most ambitious engagements to date.
One partnership, two storefront generations
SDG’s work with SKIMS spans two generations of its storefront: the original headed Shopify site and the subsequent headless Hydrogen build. Both carried the same expectation: the experience has to feel unmistakably SKIMS, and the engineering has to support the business behind it.
Our work began with the build and launch of skims.com on headed Shopify. It continued with a new headless SKIMS storefront on Hydrogen. Together, these builds span the breadth of SDG’s product and engineering capabilities.
The original skims.com, built on headed Shopify
SDG built and launched the original SKIMS site as a headed Shopify storefront: the storefront experience and commerce platform working together within Shopify’s native model. This was the foundation of our work with the brand, before its move to a headless architecture.
The assignment was much broader than applying a visual layer to a store. SDG’s role extended across the architecture, implementation, launch, and scaling of the site. The work connected the brand’s customer-facing experience with the commerce foundation it depended on.
An enterprise first on Shopify Hydrogen
SDG then built and launched SKIMS on Hydrogen, making SKIMS the first enterprise brand to launch on Shopify’s headless framework. The implementation paired Hydrogen with Oxygen hosting and Sanity CMS.
This was an architectural shift, not a change of theme. A headless storefront separates the customer-facing experience from the commerce platform. For SKIMS, SDG carried responsibility across that boundary, bringing the storefront build and its underlying commerce architecture together.
The milestone matters because it reflects applied engineering at enterprise scale. SDG took the platform into a major brand’s live shopping experience, with responsibility for building and scaling the implementation, not just advising on a technology choice.
Architecture, build, and scale
SDG architected, built, and scaled nearly every aspect of this site build. That breadth is what makes SKIMS one of our greatest works to date: the responsibility ran through the engagement, rather than ending at a narrow deliverable or a single layer of the stack.
- Commerce architecture across both headed Shopify and headless Hydrogen implementations.
- Storefront engineering for the original SKIMS site and its subsequent headless build.
- Implementation, launch, and scaling as connected parts of the same delivery responsibility.
The full SDG skill set, in practice
The result is a body of work that reaches from native Shopify to custom headless commerce, with SDG delivering both generations of the SKIMS storefront. SKIMS illustrates why clients bring SDG the builds with the most at stake: we can own the architecture and the execution, and carry both through launch and scale.
For brands planning a similarly ambitious program, explore our fashion and apparel practice, Shopify development capabilities, and Shopify and Sanity integration work.
Explore the work
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