Brand Spotlight: Off-White - Topic of the day 2/6/25
"Established in 2013 by Virgil Abloh, Off-White™ is defining the grey area between black and white as a color. Under the brand name, seasonal collections of men’s and women’s clothing, objects, furniture, and publications are articulating a current cultural vision. Collections are embedded in a recurrent back story with an emphasis on creating garments that have an identity by design. With a clear vision of splicing the reality of how clothes are worn and the artistic expression of high-fashion, Off-White explores concepts in the realm of youth culture in the contemporary context." -from Off-White website, more here
How do you feel about Off-White? If you've never been exposed to it what are your first impressions? How does Off-White compare with other streetwear brands, or other luxury brands? Any standout items/collections?
(sidebar: it's natural to speak of Virgil Abloh within this topic; try to keep your thoughts about him related to Off-White, at least for this TOTD)
17 Replies
Honestly? Brand basically ended in any meaningful sense with his parting.
I like off white. To me the brand has developed a unique vision in parody of consumerism in general. It's all fairly surface level and accessible. Frequently corny. Materials and silhouettes are always underwhelming to me and feel dated but overall there is always something i can enjoy. Also love anything that opens up an accessible form of abstraction in art without any real for of pretension
While it had been done before and could have been something by Junya, the arcteryx collection did feel ahead of its time to me.
this always left me with a really bad taste in my mouth though https://www.nytimes.com/2020/08/13/fashion/virgil-abloh-walter-van-beirendonck-kanye-west-louis-vuitton.html
By Ezra Marcus
The New York Times
Belgian Designer Accuses Virgil Abloh of Copying. Again. (Published...
Walter Van Beirendonck says Louis Vuitton’s latest men’s collection looks familiar, and Kanye West steps into the fray.
I think juxtapositions and contrasts make for an interesting design language virgil thoroughly explored during Off-White. While he had a lot of misses and sometimes his idea were too shallow/simple, he did create some fantastic products as well
His attention to detail when it came to trims was unmatched compared to other luxury brands
some of his silhouettes also lacked originality but were made up for by clear design language, color combinations and use of material. like here, which is from the same show as the arcteryx picture i posted earlier. this could not be anything else than off white if you'd ask me
wasnt he accused of lifting several other designs too? Pyer Moss and even design students
absolutely
At least 5 times
I remember almost buying this scarf in 2017. it was 150, which was above my budget at the time
I disagree but it definitely left it in a weird place. Every collection since his passing has been a tribute to him in some regard and i think they need to take a step forward and use his design philosophy to do something fresh
The runway they did after his passing with the eyelets was super cool and creative imo, lemme pull it up
https://fashionista.com/2023/03/off-white-fall-2023-review
This was kamaras debut collection too
Absolutely fire stuff
But since then nothing has really stood out to me that much
Yeah. Thats the one thing thatll sour virgil for me is his constant plagiarism of younger talent and industry professionals alike
Like with the walter incident, he accused walter of cultural appropriation when the dude is well documented for being pretty upfront about all of his inspiration
As if that even diminishes the plagiarism itself anyhow
This is the piece that really got me into the brand, even though its not my style at all i loved the execution
It’s bad
16-17 year old me thought it was the coolest shit ever
But yeah it doesnt hit at all :xd:
RIP off white
the problem with kamara was that he could not keep up, his creativity ran dry after that season
I thought his debut was very strong and everything he did after ranging from mid to atrocious
I mean some of the stuff that walter put out is definitely in bad taste if you look at it nowadays, even if he was up front about his inspirations
I'd have to go back to look at individual shows of Walter but he keeps dodging the allegations by blaming the current zeitgeist and that he's always up front about his inspirations from various cultures but he definitely was on the wrong side of what he calls 'a thin line' a couple of times
anyways, i dont wanna go off topic too much as this is about OW
I think Abloh being inspired constantly by the contemporary made his collections reflective of a new time in fashion that had become increasingly digitised and democratised
Off-white was easy to understand yet hard to replicate
(effectively)