Black Fashion Talks:
ROBIN GIVHAN
An Intimate Conversation on Virgil Abloh, Fashion, Culture, and Legacy
Black Fashion Talks | Robin Givhan
Presented with neue house
Black Fashion Fair presents a conversation with Pulitzer Prize-winning
journalist and cultural critic Robin Givhan, whose body of work has
profoundly shaped the way we understand fashion as a lens for race,
power, and identity. As The Washington Post’s senior critic-at-large,
Givhan has written extensively on the intersections of politics, the arts,
and style—from the runways of Paris to the cultural impact of Michelle
Obama’s wardrobe.
In this talk, Givhan reflects on her career chronicling fashion as both a
business and a cultural force. She will also discuss her new book, Make
It Ours: Crashing the Gates of Culture with Virgil Abloh—a compelling
portrait of Abloh’s groundbreaking legacy and a broader meditation on
Black creativity, taste, and disruption within the fashion establishment.
Through intimate and thoughtful dialogue, Black Fashion Fair continues
the work of centering the voices shaping the Black fashion
narrative—amplifying stories that challenge, inspire, and reimagine the
future of fashion, style, and culture.
ticketing
General Admission
VIP Admission (with book)
TIME
6:00PM
LOcation:
DATE
June 23
about the author
Robin Givhan is Washington Post’s senior
critic-at-large, writing about politics, race, and the
arts. Previously, she covered the fashion industry
as a business, as a cultural institution, and as pure
pleasure. She is the Pulitzer Prize winner for
criticism and author of The Battle of Versailles:
The Night American Fashion Stumbled into the
Spotlight and Made History. In addition to the Post,
where she has also covered Michelle Obama,
Givhan has worked at Newsweek, Daily Beast,
Vogue, and the Detroit Free Press.
-
BY ROBIN GIVHAN
Virgil Abloh’s iconic rise to the top of the fashion industry embodied a groundbreaking transformation of the relationship between who we are and what we wear.
Abloh’s appointment as head of menswear for Louis Vuitton in 2018 shocked the fashion industry, as he became the first Black designer to serve as artistic director in the brand’s 164-year history. But as Pulitzer Prize–winning culture critic Robin Givhan reveals, Abloh’s story encompasses so much more than his own journey.
Using Abloh’s surprising path to the top of the luxury establishment, Givhan unfolds the larger story of how the cloistered, exclusive fashion world faced a revolution from below in the form of streetwear and designers unafraid to storm the gates—how their notions of what was luxury simultaneously anticipated and upended consumer preferences, and how a simple T-shirt held as much cultural power as a haute couture gown. As Givhan relays, Abloh rose during a time of existential angst for a fashion industry trying to make sense of its responsibilities to a diverse audience and the challenges of selling status to a generation of consumers who fetishized sneakers and prioritized comfort. How that moment came to be—how someone like Abloh, who had no formal training in patternmaking or tailoring, could come to symbolize and embody the industry’s way forward—is the story at the heart of this book.
Make It Ours is at once a remarkable biography of a singular creative force and a powerful meditation on fashion and race, taste and exclusivity, genius and luxury. With access to Abloh’s family, friends, collaborators, and contemporaries, and featuring a cast of fascinating characters ranging from visionary Black designers like Ozwald Boateng to Abloh’s mercurial but critical employer and mentor Kanye West, Givhan weaves a spellbinding tale of a young man’s rise amid a cultural moment that would upend a century’s worth of ideas about luxury and taste. -
“Robin’s look into the life and work of the late, great, Virgil Abloh is thoughtful, intelligent, honest, and masterfully crafted. Virgil’s freethinking and influence on the possibilities of what creativity can be was a tour de force. She brilliantly captures Virgil’s fearless march forward through his insatiable curiosity, kindness, humility, generosity, and relentless work ethic.”—Marc Jacobs, founding creative director of Louis Vuitton ready-to-wear
“A brilliant, captivating book. Robin Givhan brings us inside Virgil Abloh’s world, offering fresh insight into his early game-changing culture projects, his fascinating relationship with Kanye West, and the birth of Off-White and his ascension at Louis Vuitton. Make It Ours makes the case for a true cultural giant. A must-read for fashionistas, museumgoers, and sneaker heads alike.”—Elaine Welteroth, bestselling author of More Than Enough
“Virgil’s journey from humble beginnings to the top of the fashion industry is one that needs to be studied. Make It Ours is a thrilling journey into the mind of a genius.”—Edward Enninful, former editor in chief of British Vogue
“Make It Ours is a captivating and beautifully written biography of the talented Virgil Abloh. Virgil was a rule breaker who always had his finger on the pulse, and Robin Givhan’s unique perspective and meticulous research expertly chronicles his unconventional path and meteoric rise in fashion. Thought-provoking, emotional, and illuminating, this book is a definite must-read!”—Tom Ford, designer and filmmaker
BE IN THE KNOW
BE THE FIRST TO DISCOVER EXCLUSIVE COLLECTIONS FORM BLACK dESIGNERS,
GET INSIDER ACCESS TO EVENTS, AND RECEIVE THE LATEST NEWS ON PARTNER-
SHIPS, TRENDS, AND STORIES THAT CELEBRATE BLACKNESS IN FASHION.
DON’TMISS OUT-SUBSCRIBE NOW TO JOIN US IN RESHAPING BLACK FASHION; PAST,
PRESENT, AND FUTURE