Matt Varga Paris’ Spring/Summer showcases are in full swing, but in our corner of the world, the biggest show in the city is the Virgil Abloh Archive. Telegraphed far ahead of time as a celebration of the life and times of the late Off-White founder, the actual showcase has already brought tons to the newswire, including a viridescent version of the Air Force 1 carrying the exhibition’s name.
While Abloh’s success with the Uptown makes that a shoe that fans will flock to, we’re also getting a look at an unprecedented design with Abloh’s signature touches. While it’s hard to suss out exactly what model is on display here, it’s certainly an indoor variation of the Nike Football legacy, comparing to the exposed, crossed stitching from the Tiempo, Gato, or T90. Bearing an all-white colorway, leather lining, and fire red details, including a trademark zip tie, the biggest hardware twist comes underfoot, where a translucent cage a la the Cryoshot appears. On top of being a significant aesthetic draw, it sets up a serious question regarding this shoe’s design: when precisely could it have been formulated?
Even if you assigned a conservative estimate to how long the Cryoshot was in the works before its reveal earlier this year, that’d still place the seeds of its converted concept years after Abloh’s passing. Thus, it’s tough to decode whether this is something that the eventual LV head stamped or a posthumous design — if these ever see public release, that mystery being resolved is something we’ll have an eye on.
For now, things are genuinely shrouded in mystery. What is crystal clear is the in-person shots that brought this to the surface; catch it embedded once more below.
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