Just over a month after the late Virgil Abloh’s final presentation for Louis Vuitton, the designer’s instalment for his personal brand Off-White opened Paris autumn-winter 2022 fashion week.
The event – which was livestreamed in nearly 100 French selling points – was a poignant realisation of the hard work Abloh delivered in the final stages of his life, before his death from cancer in November 2021. Suffice it to say, his personal touch was present in every detail.
In the symbolically charged halls of the former Paris stock exchange was held a show entitled Spaceship Earth: An “Imaginary Experience”, meant to evoke the arenas of historic world fairs. The setting visually and symbolically brought together cultures long held distinct: there was a magnified replica of the chandelier of the historic Hotel Majestic opposite a wall of loudspeakers – complete with a performance by Jeff Mills, pioneer of Detroit techno.
This meeting of contrasting worlds continued in the deployment of three intertwined and oddly complementary themes: namely an exploration of sexiness – through party girl bling era minidresses, apparent thongs poking out of low-rise jeans, fit for the current Y2K revival. That was followed by a rereading of men’s tailoring, with skateboard-inspired lines and volumes, such as a shell jacket constructed from canvas, graffiti jacquard and intricately crafted blousons. And finally, an entire segment unveiled Off-White’s “skiwear line”, which came complete with kitten heeled snow-boots, tech pile pieces and a functional wardrobe fit for the slopes as well as the club. Walking in front of Rihanna, A$AP Rocky and Pharrell Williams, models held white flags spelling out the words “question everything”.
A coup de théâtre awaited guests after the first part of the show: on the catwalk, the launch of what the press release described as an “Off-White high fashion collection” took place, consisting of a “couture-like” endeavour entitled “>Than a Bride”. Although the brand doesn’t hold the haute couture title, it follows one of Abloh’s longstanding passions. He had previously concluded his shows with couture-standard dresses – and chosen to present past ready-to-wear collections during the Paris couture week.
Each look was built into a distinct characters such as “the Fangirl”, the “New York City Ballet”, “the Stripper” or “the Carrie B”. Opening the section was “the Bride”, donning a white silk taffeta dress, pulled up at the front to “evoke the gesture of a girl pulling up her skirt to dance at a party”, worn by Bella Hadid, holding her heels in her hands and coiffed with a veiled baseball cap. Overbearing tulle came mixed with a vintage T-shirt; a bustier embroidered in rhinestones was paired with shorts and accessorised with a BABE-embroidered cigarette case. In the world of Abloh, haute couture becomes “haute couture” and inevitably questions its contours.
The collection poses the question of the future of Off-White without its creator. The house has indicated that nobody is planned to replace Abloh, aiming at a more collective approach. Recently, executives from LVMH (holder of most of the brand) and New Guards (the co-founding group behind Off-White) revealed the rich material left by the creator. This, as was said at Business of Fashion, will allow “harnessing his legacy to build a multibillion-dollar brand”.
