The Louis Vuitton and Off-White designer Virgil Abloh passed away
After a private multi-year battle with cancer, Virgil Abloh passed away on November 28. The iconic menswear artistic director of Louis Vuitton and founder and CEO of Off-White was only 41 years young. He was a boundary-breaking creative force at the forefront of contemporary fashion and society.
The acclaimed fashion designer was known for changing the face of streetwear and luxury clothes. He left his position as Kanye West’s creative advisor with his own vision, which he realized through his work at fashion and streetwear company Pyrex Vision. Virgil Abloh was the first Black fashion designer to lead the Louis Vuitton’s menswear brand, and later on found and led his popular luxury label Off-White.
Virgil Abloh passed away due to being diagnosed with a type of cancer named cardiac angiosarcoma back in 2019. Keeping his health in a private manner, only his close relatives were aware of the diagnosis. With the permission from his family, tributes were paid to Abloh shortly after the announcement.
In a previously planned fashion-show in Miami, Louis Vuitton held a tribute to the pioneering designer shortly after the news that Virgil Abloh passed. In the theme of “Virgil was here”, a long list of industry icons and celebrities attended the show to pay their respects including Kanye West, Kim Kardashian, Rihanna, A$AP Rocky, Bella Hadid, Pharrell Williams, Tahar Rahim, Venus Williams, Joe Jonas, Ricky Martin, Jeremy Pope, 21 Savage, Joan Smalls, and Bernard Arnault.
As a designer and creative director, Virgil Abloh used a strategy that relied on art history, youth culture, graphic design, music, and more to integrate the industries of modern culture and luxury fashion. Before Virgil Abloh passed away, he was just recently rewriting his place with LV and in fashion history by creating what he loved, and was destined, to do. Virgin Abloh is remembered through his children Lowe and Grey, and his wife Shannon.