Off-White: A Brief History
Off-White: A Brief History
Pyrex Vision was a company at the genesis of the luxury streetwear industry. After graduating from university, the fashion brand’s creative designer, Virgil Abloh, began interning in 2009 at Fendi in the same class as the rap musician, Kanye West. Placed in the company's office in Rome, Italy, the two artists began a collaborative relationship. A year later, West appointed Abloh the creative director of his creative agency, DONDA. In 2011, West asked him to serve as the creative director for the 2011 Jay-Z/Kanye West album Watch the Throne. In 2012, Abloh launched his first company, Pyrex Vision, a small boutique of couture streetwear. Abloh purchased deadstock clothing from Ralph Lauren for $40, screen-printed designs on them and sold them for prices upward of $550. For Virgil Abloh, the company was the conceptualization of a larger societal allegory to the dialogue of Chicago streets; pyrex being associated with drug use, and ‘23’ being the basketball number of the legendary Chicago Bulls all-star, Michael Jordan. He closed the company down a year later as he did not intend it to become a commercial enterprise but an artistic experiment, however incendiary, Pyrex Vision was merely a stepping stone.