The Designer Changing Fashion—and Rugs, Luggage, and Bottled Water, Too

Over the summer, Chicago was transformed into a style nerve center—Saks Fifth Avenue and Neiman Marcus unveiled streetwear displays in their windows, an Apple store held a series of design labs, and the Museum of Streetwear opened a pop-up shop. The activity was all clustered around “Figures of Speech,” an exhibition about influential designer Virgil Abloh at the Museum of Contemporary Art Chicago.

More than 100,000 visitors, most of them young, have flocked to see a dress Abloh designed for Beyoncé, a belt he made for A$AP Rocky, and an embossing plate he created for Jay-Z and Kanye West’s collaborative album Watch the Throne. Unreleased prototypes of other products are shown off near rainbow T-shirts designed for Louis Vuitton, where Abloh was named men’s artistic director a year ago.