OFF-WHITE C/O VIRGIL ABLOH SPRING SUMMER 2020 WOMEN’S COLLECTION – PARIS FASHION WEEK
“The fundamental concept is to illustrate a woman’s power. To show that her spirit is indestructible by natural forces. She can withstand a “meteor shower” both metaphorically and physically speaking”
Virgil Abloh
Unexpected impacts. Evolutionary jolts. Collisions of matter, and ideas.
For Spring, Virgil Abloh tampers with convention, expressing a desire to push the conversations around fashion, streetwear and modern dressing forward. Clothes do not define the Off-White woman; vintage luxury or new, they’re the same. The garments, rather, become tools and materials that help fortify this woman’s dynamism and resilience.
Abloh continues with an inspiration based in nature after Resort, but interjects a new aesthetic element: one of extraterrestrial force, of meteor showers, and of the unlikely beauty in the order-and-chaos they make.
Patterns are twisted and warped; contrasting fabrics are joined; netting and unusual draping methods are fused to generate new surfaces. Spring is not a reset, but rather, a transformation in context and space.
This season sees the introduction of the Meteor Shower Jitney, Spring’s hero piece. The Jitney bag is a core Off-White product, but the Meteor Shower stands apart; it is perforated with holes in a graphic rendering of craters formed by falling rock. It is a non-functioning object (though it comes with a usable pouch), and it challenges the bedrock understanding of what, exactly, a bag is. It instantaneously kicks dust into the proverbial atmosphere of categorical separation; whether carrier, sculpture, or decor item, the Meteor Shower Jitney asserts that Abloh is seeking to further chart the gray areas between creative disciplines. The perforations also set a new branding system for Off-White.
Augmenting the suggestion of shooting stars and the unforeseen, Spring holds a collaboration with Roman and Erwan Bouroullec. The Bouroullec brothers are Paris-based industrial designers, with experience in medias ranging from jewelry to architecture to photography and video. For Off-White, they have applied a linear print—mirroring slices of shale amplified beneath a microscope—to shirting, overcoats, and handbags.
The hole motif also serves as an ironic homage to Abloh’s alma mater, the University of Wisconsin. In the state, athletics fans wear “cheesehead” hats and helmets, as Wisconsin is historically known for its dairy products. The hats are a common, if eccentric, sight at sporting events.
