Virgil Abloh explains the Off-White x Nike collection “The Ten”

There is no much to Saturday, September 9, when the top five pairs of the collection “The Ten” Off-White x Nike (Air Jordan 1, Nike Blazer, Nike Air Presto, Nike Air Max 90 and Nike Air VaporMax) will hit the stores and, to celebrate the project, in this day NYC is taking place Nike Off Campus, a series of discussions and workshops that will explore the ideas and design solutions that have led to the creation of the capsule collection of Virgil Abloh x Nike.

Yesterday morning, to inaugurate the event was just the designer’s friend Kanye West, who, along with Nike VP of Footwear Design, Andy Caine, spoke of his work for “The Ten”.

Here are the most interesting points.

#1 STARTING POINTS

"I looked at this whole project as passing the baton and doing right by all the innovation, but adding a lifestyle layer to it. These shoes are icons, they’ve transcended into another space, and this project was sort of highlighting what emotional attachment these objects that are just things you wear on your feet can get a second life, where we can look at them in 2017 and understand how important they were in the past".

#2 Jordan’s effect

Speaking of the inspiration behind “The Ten”, Abloh says:

"Those teenage years are sort of the foundation for the adult version of yourself…I was, you know, an hour outside of Chicago, so Michael Jordan was my superman". 

No particular plan, Virgil’s approach to the collection is as natural as that of a teenager.

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All you have to know about Virgil Abloh x Nike "Off Campus"

#3 You snooze, you lose

" I work 24/7. When someone’s sleeping, someone is working. I figured out this format to join my whole team on a WhatsApp group chat, so it’s all time zones, new ideas if I see something. For example, that shoe [Air Jordan 1] originally was all-white. I was in the airport at Newark [N.J.] and I can remember, I was going through security and I saw somebody in a white pair of Dunks, and I couldn’t tell the difference. I was like, 'Emergency. The Jordan needs to be the Chicago colorway'. That shoe would have been sort of an anonymous white shoe".

#4 Nike’s open mind

Virgil thanks Nike for being completely open to his ideas, even when he walked into the office with an X-ACTO knife and wanted to chop up some shoes.

#5 Two advices for designers

"Since nothing is going to be perfect anyways, do it on the next one. Iterate. There’s no wrong answers in design".

"Find your constant source of inspiration and attach onto it. For me, it’s conversations all over the world".

Watch the full video of The Ten: A Crash Course above.