The entrepreneur and fashion designer who was named by Time magazine to be one of the 100 most influential people in the world in 2018, Virgil Abloh made a lot for the fashion and the rap industries. Here are five things to know about the well-known streetwear designer.
credit:Vogue
Who was Virgil Abloh ?
Born in Rockford, Illinois, to Ghanaian parents on September, 30, 1980, Virgil Abloh graduated from the University of Wisconsin as a civil engineer before getting a Master’s degree in Architecture at the Illinois Institute of Technology. Known as a close friend and a creative advisor to the rapper Kanye West, Virgil Abloh launched his own streetwear label, Off-White, in September 2013.
His rising career
Being close to the artist Kanye West made people talk about Virgil Abloh and this recognition allowed him to work for the collaboration album of Jay-Z and Kanye West, Watch the Throne in 2011. He directed the album and earned a Grammy nomination for it.
In 2012 he launched his first company, Pyrex Vision, which was designing clothes for youth but he chose to put an end to the adventure one year later because he saw it more as an artistic experiment than a commercial enterprise.
Off-White
The designer said that the brand’s name comes from : “the gray area between black and white as the color off-white”. He also might have named his brand Off-White to make it wearable for everyone.
Abloh first launched Off-White womenswear in 2014 and when Beyoncé wore a palm-print sweatshirt in a music video titre, the brand went famous worldwide and Abloh was one of the finalists of the 2015 LVMH prize but he lost to the duo Marques’Almeida and the designer Simon Porte Jacquemus.
With social media the brand gained a lot of success amongst millennials and it counts more than 10,7 million Instagram followers and the designer has 7,1 million followers.
Collaborations
Crédit : Nike “The Ten”
Virgil Abloh really did standout collaborations. To name but a few, Louis Vuitton, Nike, Ikea. In 2017, he recreated 10 of the iconic Nike’s sneakers collection in a project named “The Ten”. In March 2018, he was named artistic director of Louis Vuitton, and Rihanna showed his creation at 2018 Fashion’s Week in Paris. He also created an original outfit for the tennis player Serena Williams.
Music
Crédit : Watch The Throne, Kanye West and Jay-Z
Throughout his life, Abloh’s interest in music allowed him to design and direct album artworks and music videos. One of them is the 2011 critically acclaimed album Watch The Throne. He was also in charge of the art direction of plenty of albums of ASAP Rocky, Kid Cudi and Lil Wayne to name a few. Kanye West also named Abloh creative director of DONDA, West’s creative house which is also the name of his last album.
Abloh died on November, 28, 2021, due to cancer at 41 years old and his close friends and collaborators Kanye West, Drake, Kid Cudi and others attended his funeral.
R.I.P Virgil Abloh
credit: LVMH
écrit par Bakary
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