RSVP Gallery is a pivotal moment in Abloh first stepping into the limelight, but a true showing of his visions began with West and Jay-Z’s “Watch the Throne” tour in 2011, which he designed the stage for with artist Es Devlin. He was officially named West’s creative director.Īlso in 2009, he opened Chicago store RSVP Gallery with Marc Moran and Don C in Wicker Park, offering luxury and contemporary fashion and streetwear brands like Chanel, Comme des Garçons and Bape showcasing artworks by Takashi Murakami and Kaws, who designed the cover art for West’s albums “Graduation” and “808s and Heartbreak,” respectively, and hosted events featuring rappers close to the team, including Pharrell Williams and N.E.R.D., Kid Cudi and Lupe Fiasco, among others. In 2007, West hired Abloh and they briefly worked on West’s first fashion project, Pastelle, together.įrom there, he interned at Fendi with West in 2009 and would later attend Paris Fashion Week, an experience that has been immortalized by the Tommy Ton street-style photo of Abloh photographed with West, Don C, Taz Arnold, Fonzworth Bentley and Chris Julian. Abloh said during NBA All-Star Weekend in Chicago in 2020 that he skipped final thesis presentations at the university to meet with West at an autograph signing. He met Kanye West’s music manager John Monopoly and his cousin Don C, who were both looking for designers to work with West going forward. While studying at university, he worked on clothes with Chicago music producer Jay Boogie and Custom Kings, and contributed to Chicago blog The Brilliance. Though he was a trained architect, his career has deeper roots in the skate, music, streetwear and blog scenes.Ībloh told GQ that he started DJing at the age of 17, touted skate brands like Alien Workshop, Santa Cruz and Droors as his favorite brands and got his first glimpse into the convergence of skate and streetwear through New York City streetwear brand Alife. Born in Rockford, Ill., Abloh graduated with a Bachelor of Science in civil engineering from the University of Wisconsin-Madison and received his Master of Architecture at the Illinois Institute of Technology.

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