What is Virgil Abloh?
System couldn’t seem to make up its mind. So, we spent the past six months with the Off-White™ impresario in London, New York, São Paulo, Los Angeles, Stockholm, Paris, Milan and Amsterdam, as well as organising introductions between Virgil and other restless conversationalists, including arts curator extraordinaire Hans Ulrich Obrist and Virgil’s student-years hero, architect Rem Koolhaas.
We also went deep behind the scenes of his collaboration-in-the-making with the €35.1-billion-a-year mega-brand, IKEA – producing a 66-page supplement along the way. We then asked dozens of industry figures – among them, Marco Bizzarri, Edward Enninful, Marc Newson, Peter Saville and Jenny Holzer – to go on the record with their personal opinion of Virgil Abloh. And, finally, we sent him off for a sauna with Juergen Teller.
The result? We’re exhausted. Overwhelmed. Spent.
Though Virgil, it seems, is – literally and figuratively – just getting warmed up.
System 10 also features:
A rare glimpse into the world of Jil Sander. Including a stroll around her sumptuous garden and private Hamburg residence, as part of a 50-page report featuring Sander in conversation with super-stylist, Joe McKenna, and photography by Norbert Schoerner.
Model of the moment, Adwoa Aboah and her close-knit family – sister Kesewa, dad Charles and mother Camilla Lowther – invite Juergen Teller into their London home to talk hairy upper-lips, family bust-ups and love-ins.
Fashion’s master storyteller Tim Blanks relays tales from his spectacularly colourful life, unearths eye-popping imagery from his youth as a glam-rock obsessive, and asks Juergen Teller over to photograph his hairy legs, and a hairier pair of Jack Russells.
Plus, a season behind the scenes at Sies Marjan by photographer Colin Dodgson. A look into the life and inspirations of stylist and photographer, Venetia Scott. Juergen Teller shoots Saint Laurent by Anthony Vaccarello at the foot of the Eiffel Tower. Haider Ackermann talks transforming Berluti, while Natacha Ramsay-Levi explains her series of firsts at Chloé. Alexander Fury recounts his quest to track down his dream vintage Lacroix. Avant-garde technologist, Iris van Herpen looks back on 10 years of innovative fashion, with photographs by Solve Sundsbo. Hermès, through the eyes of the legendary, late photographer Bill King. Elise Crombez getting wet with Charlotte Wales and Camille Bidault-Waddington. And Jonathan Saunders on being a Scotsman in New York.
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