“Luxury can be interpreted in many ways, and I want to create something that makes people drool and crave.” – Virgil Abloh
Last night, designer Virgil Abloh’s personal social platform suddenly announced that the designer himself passed away due to cancer – cardiac angiosarcoma – on November 28th local time, at the age of 41.
Virgil Abloh is the Men’s Artistic Director of Louis Vuitton, founder of Off-White c/o Virgil Abloh, as well as a DJ, artist, graphic designer, stylist, and photographer. He is deeply interested in all things related to creation and creativity. For him, the identity and meaning of a creator is: “I create things, but I hope to leave the work of ‘defining’ to others.” From being unknown to becoming famous, and then becoming a leading figure in the fashion industry, this creator has never wanted to stop – even though he has been seriously ill for the past two years, he still insists on using action and all his strength to give more important meaning to his mission, identity, and existence. Now, even if he can no longer meet everyone, the influence of this creator will become even more far-reaching; it’s just that, in form, it will once again become even more different.
Feeling inexplicably sad, watching the news of the tragedy unfold, with major designers each posting their condolences to him, whether followers or opponents of Virgil, it’s hard not to feel a sense of unease. As one of the most influential designers and creators of modern times, Virgil Abloh’s life was very short, but more meaningful than anyone could have imagined. While we digest this heavy news today, we may want to take another look at the important moments in the life of this popular and controversial designer, moments where he reshaped himself and the world.
1) The Birth and Enlightenment of Virgil Abloh
On September 30, 1980, a baby boy was born to a Ghanaian immigrant family in Illinois, USA, and his name was Virgil Abloh. Growing up in Rockford, Virgil Abloh attended Boylan Catholic High School and in his graduating year (1998), he officially became a professional DJ, aspiring to become a full-time DJ. Later on, during his university years, he studied civil engineering and obtained a master’s degree in architecture from the Illinois Institute of Technology four years after graduating. It was on the campus of IIT that Virgil Abloh was drawn to a teaching building and began his foray into designing clothing, inspired by the renowned architect Rem Koolhaas, who had previously collaborated with Prada. Koolhaas is often referred to as the mentor who introduced Virgil Abloh to the world of fashion.
2) Virgil Abloh and Kanye West
Shortly after graduating, the 22-year-old Virgil Abloh met the then super popular rapper Kanye West in a Chicago print shop where he was responsible for designing T-shirts. Later, after an introduction, he was invited to meet Kanye West’s then manager, John Monopoly, and was hired on the spot as Kanye West’s creative consultant.
And more importantly, Kanye and Virgil’s meeting and collaboration in 2009 marked a turning point, with both entering Fendi as interns. This position facilitated a better collaboration between the two, ultimately leading Virgil to join Kanye’s mysterious creative think tank DONDA in 2012, where he was appointed as the creative director of Donda.
My favorite brand: Louis Vuitton
In 2005, it was a year worth mentioning.
At the time when Virgil had not yet obtained a master’s degree in architecture, he co-operated with Chicago designers Benjamin Edgar and Chuck Anderson to operate an online blog called THE BRILLIANCE, irregularly writing about topics such as design, architecture, music, and life, and inviting visitors to submit their own ideas, product designs, etc.
THE BRILLIANCE is so important not only because it showcases Virgil’s immense interest in contemporary culture and many unique insights, but more importantly, in an old post, Virgil talks about his favorite brands, and Louis Vuitton, which he now heads, is one of the brands mentioned. It’s as if this was meant to happen.
4) Making a name for oneself at Paris Fashion Week
In 2009, Virgil interned at FENDI with Kanye West. The then CEO of FENDI, Michael Burke, described Virgil as “a creative force like no other” and has been keeping an eye on him ever since they met that day.
After officially stepping into the fashion world, Virgil and Kanye began to appear at different fashion shows and gained attention. Among them, a group photo with friends such as Don C, Taz Arnold, Chris Julian, Farnsworth Bentley at a Comme des Garçons fashion show not only became a classic photo but also hailed as a turning point for the two in fighting for survival space and attention in the fashion world, which has always been exclusive to black people.
5) Virgil Abloh has long been a nominee for the Grammy Awards.
As the creative director of DONDA, Virgil created artwork for Kanye West and Jay-Z’s album “Watch The Throne” in 2011, drawing inspiration from the religious style patterns of then Givenchy creative director Riccardo Tisci and interpreting them in his own way. This creation not only earned Virgil and his team a Grammy nomination for “Best Recording Package,” but also solidified Virgil’s ideology towards design and aesthetics moving forward.
6) Without Pyrex, perhaps there would be no OFF-WHITE.
Time shifted to 2012, Virgil Abloh, who gained several years of important experience, officially established his personal brand Pyrex Vision, with the background of creating a luxury streetwear brand that embodies 90s popular culture. In terms of design, it features a large amount of oversized prints, patterns, and screen printing elements. Later, when OFF-WHITE was officially established, many people believed that Pyrex had set a very distinct brand foundation for OFF-WHITE.
Virgil, who has always been a controversial figure, also faced controversy during the Pyrex era. At that time, it was discovered that the flannel shirts priced at over $550 under Pyrex Vision were actually made from Ralph Lauren’s old products, leading to criticism that Virgil was just a designer who knew how to copy, but was charging nearly 700% more than the original. Regarding this matter, Virgil once described his intention in establishing Pyrex Vision in a later interview, sharing: “I wanted to imply an emotion around clothing, which turned into a metaphor, representing me reshaping what young kids want to happen in fashion – picking and wearing clothes in an ironic way, or wearing them in a surprising way that goes beyond the designer’s original intention.”
7) Success is “Been Trill”, failure is also “Been Trill”
After making his debut as a DJ, Virgil Abloh brought in his friend, Matthew Williams, who was working at DONDA at the time and is now the creative director of Givenchy. They teamed up with Justin Saunders from JJJJound, designer Heron Preston, and soccer player Florencia Galarza to form the DJ group “Been Trill,” gradually organizing various underground parties in the fashion world. Later on, they started creating patterns with a Tumblr aesthetic and $100 shoelaces, turning streetwear into high-end products. They eventually caught the attention of streetwear brands like KTZ, Stussy, and Hood By Air, releasing different limited capsule collections.
Unfortunately, criticism and controversy continue, Been Trill sold its brand to Pac-Sun in just one year, only to be buried a year later by the super popular rapper A$AP Rocky in his hit song “Multiply” with the lyrics “I ain’t fxxking with that Being Trill”.
8) OFF-WHITE officially established
2013 was a very important year.
Virgil Abloh, with the assistance of the Italian fashion group New Guards Group, founded and launched his personal brand OFF-WHITE (now renamed OFF-WHITE c/o Virgil Abloh), with headquarters in Milan. Virgil Abloh’s aesthetic propositions and design concepts have officially become popular worldwide, with designs featuring hand-drawn quotation marks, zip ties, large block letters, and caution tape, becoming the brand’s signature. This design language rooted in streetwear was later expanded by Virgil Abloh to different levels, with its influence even extending to the high-end fashion world. Of course, the most important thing is that OFF-WHITE and Virgil Abloh officially entered Paris Fashion Week, allowing the fashion world to witness the power of streetwear stepping onto the fashion stage. In just a few years, their business has expanded to cities like Hong Kong, Tokyo, and New York, becoming a generational icon in the evolution of fashion.
9) Unprecedented collaboration: OFF-WHITE x Nike “THE TEN” series
The establishment of OFF-WHITE undoubtedly became an important moment in overturning the fashion world. Within 3 years of its founding, it became a finalist for the LVMH Prize, with Virgil Abloh’s idol Raf Simons being one of the judges, and was nominated – presenting the first menswear collection FW16 at Paris Fashion Week, being inducted into the “BoF 500” Hall of Fame, and collaborating with IKEA for the first time.
Until 2017, Virgil Abloh, who has always been passionate about street and Hip-Hop culture, collaborated with Nike to create the most influential collaborative sneaker series to date, “The Ten,” personally selecting ten classic Nike sneakers for redesign. Retaining the original silhouette, the shoes feature distinctive elements such as transparent materials, zippers, exposed details, and printing, echoing his background as an architect. The blueprint-like design concept fully embodies his obsession with reshaping history and culture, ultimately leading to a global craze and becoming the topic of the century.
Today, there is news that after Virgil Abloh’s passing, The Ten sneakers have seen a surge in prices in less than half a day. According to reports, the two most popular “sky-high priced” models, Air Jordan 1 and Air Presto, are currently being resold for over HKD 200,000, which is quite astonishing. (Of course, this trend should not be encouraged, especially since Virgil has just left us…)
10) Finally, became the Creative Director of Louis Vuitton menswear.
In the morning of March 26, 2018, Paris time, Louis Vuitton officially announced the appointment of Virgil Abloh as the Men’s Artistic Director, and will debut his first collection in June.
Becoming the first black designer in the history of the brand, Virgil Abloh chose to hold the “landmark” presentation – We Are The World, in the Royal Garden of Paris, and arranged over 2000 guests to sit on both sides of the 200-meter-long rainbow runway, with 56 models from different cultural backgrounds responsible for interpreting the collection. This concept also laid the foundation for Virgil Abloh to become an important figure in high-end fashion, and he spared no effort to realize this idea.
Taken from the “King of Pop” Michael Jackson and the legendary singer-songwriter Lionel Richie, the charity song “We Are The World” was created in 1985 to help with the Ethiopian famine. This season, it made its debut in Toronto with a live performance by the jazz group BadBadNotGood. Playboi Carti, Kid Cudi, A$AP Nast, Steve Lacy, and other musical geniuses took on the role of models. In the audience, besides inviting university students from around the world studying fashion, art, design, and architecture, we also saw Rihanna, A$AP Rocky, Kylie Jenner, Naomi Campbell, Travis Scott, Bella Hadid, and the highly anticipated appearance of Kanye West. When the two met, they embraced like old friends, unable to contain their emotions, bringing tears to everyone’s eyes. This moment was undoubtedly one of the most beautiful in Virgil Abloh’s career.
Regarding this highly anticipated fashion event, Virgil Abloh shared countless emotions in an interview after the show, three of which later became the quotes he was passionate about in his creative work:
“Over the past 10 years, we have been exploring what ‘new things’ mean. For me, it is about creating connections across generations for luxury brands. My primary task is to lay the foundation for new elements for the brand, and I have always been focused on what people truly wear. Being able to interpret this concept through luxury brands excites me.”
“This is the core I pursue in my work. Holding such a key position in such an important brand, I have a responsibility to outline a possible future society.”
“Off-White’s design is a conversation with my 17-year-old self, while at Louis Vuitton, I have to have a conversation with a brand founded in 1854 – it is witnessing history, and it is also expressing respect.”
11) Design retrospective exhibition “Figures of Speech”
After taking on the role of Artistic Director for LV menswear, the workload has undoubtedly increased, but Virgil Abloh, carrying the weight of his position, has not only not slowed down, but has become even more devoted to his creative work. Ultimately, in the same year of taking on the role, he was selected by the authoritative magazine “TIME” as one of the 100 most influential people, and in a short period of time, he held a design retrospective exhibition “Figures of Speech” in his hometown of Chicago, sharing with the world everything interesting about his creative and design work over the past 20 years.
The exhibition took place in Doha, the capital of Qatar, in October this year, and Virgil Abloh also appeared in person to open the exhibition. This was also his last appearance outside of his studio or home.
12) He has been suffering from a serious illness…
Virgil Abloh’s friend, model Hailey Bieber, and popular singer Justin Bieber got married in 2018. Virgil Abloh even personally designed an OFF-WHITE evening gown with “Till Death Do Us Part” for the bride Hailey Bieber’s wedding a year later, sending the couple his sincerest blessings. This gesture became a talk of the town at the time, and Hailey Bieber even shared many exclusive moments, including her meeting with Virgil, on their anniversary last year.
However, that autumn brought a rare situation. Virgil Abloh, who has been busy with complex work, suddenly announced to the outside world that he decided to take a three-month break due to severe mental health issues, including missing the presentation of OFF-WHITE’s Spring 2020 collection, as well as public events for Nike and IKEA. At the time, Virgil Abloh stated in an interview that he decided to pause work and return to Chicago to start recuperating based on medical advice, allowing his mental and physical health to return to its former state.
Afterwards, Virgil Abloh really started to appear more in public, and in June of this year, he brought another topic to the LV menswear with the Spring 2022 series. The luxurious Air Force 1 series that he intentionally designed in collaboration with Nike and LV became a topic of discussion. However, no one could have imagined that today, five months later, this would be the outcome. Now we finally know that the rest at that time was probably a period of adjustment for Virgil Abloh after being diagnosed with a cardiac angiosarcoma, to reorganize his mind…
On November 28, 2021, Virgil Abloh’s personal social platform suddenly announced that he had passed away due to cancer at the age of 41. The statement mentioned that since his diagnosis in 2019 with heart angiosarcoma, he had been fighting and enduring this rare and aggressive cancer without ever revealing his condition to the public, and had never considered stopping his important work spanning the fields of fashion, art, and culture.
Now, everything has turned into a bubble. The statement also emphasizes the hope that everyone will respect Virgil and his family’s privacy, and sincerely thank everyone for their love and support. After the sad news broke, the fashion industry has been sending endless blessings and condolences. LV and its parent company also announced today that with the consent and appointment of Virgil Abloh’s widow, Shannon Abloh, they hope to fulfill Virgil Abloh’s last wish to present the just completed LV menswear SS22 collection to the public as scheduled, and to echo the Art Basel Miami event scheduled for this week. The event will take place on November 30th at 5:30 PM Miami time to commemorate the important impact this designer has had in the three major areas of fashion, art, and culture.
“Sometimes fashion overlooks this point and confines itself. However, the times are constantly changing, as long as you find the right direction, the future is not far away.” Today, this creator seems to have found the right position again, choosing a more special place for everyone to get to know him better, so that he can confidently pursue that creative and futuristic world. Thank you, Rest in Paradise, Virgil Abloh (1980 – 2021).
資料及圖片來源：Web Photo
