A New Pop-Up Space For Virgil Abloh's Louis Vuitton

by SHOWstudio on 26 January 2021

As artistic director of Louis Vuitton menswear, Abloh has dreamed up gargantuan, immersive concept stores around the world for the iconic French house. London's Selfridges is the latest to get a makeover.

As artistic director of Louis Vuitton menswear, Abloh has dreamed up gargantuan, immersive concept stores around the world for the iconic French house. London's Selfridges is the latest to get a makeover.

Virgil Abloh is fashion's multi-hyphenate exemplar - sometime DJ, fashion designer, architect, artist, furniture designer, engineer and entrepreneur, he has multiple balls spinning at any given time. Since his appointment as artistic director of Louis Vuitton's menswear in 2018, Abloh has brought a playful, conceptual aesthetic to the luxury French house, played out in the brand's every fibre - manifested through social media, advertising, branded books, set design and perhaps most excitingly, in physical stores.

In his short tenure, Abloh has opened a pop-up shop at 100 Rivington Street in New York, engulfed inside and out in a shocking shade of green, a whimsical space inspired by Alice and Wonderland at Harajuku station in Tokyo, and a cacophonous installation in Miami's design district with an accompanying AR experience.

Thanks to various global COVID-19 lockdown measures, our ability to congregate and interact in fashion's bricks and mortar retail spaces is currently limited, but this has not deterred Louis Vuitton. London's iconic department store Selfridges is the latest location to get the Virgil do-over, with a Louis Vuitton menswear pop-up space dedicated to the S/S 21 collection. Although the space is currently closed, the French house will be offering virtual appointments to view the space (which can be booked online here).

Black and white checkerboard print dominates the space, while half-structures of brightly coloured red, blue and purple shipping containers contain ready-to-wear, leather goods, shoes and accessories (standouts include a white coat with a 3D lobster clambering off the shoulder and a similarly tactile hoodie with a string of teddies wreathed around the neck). Shipping containers were a theme of Abloh's highly personal S/S 21 Louis Vuitton show, in which he referenced his father's early life in the coastal city of Tema, Ghana, working in the Accra docks unloading shipping containers.

Look 25 from the Louis Vuitton S/S 21 menswear show in Tokyo

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