NEW YORK — On Sunday, Off-White made its New York Fashion Week debut, taking to a public basketball court in Brooklyn, after a previous plan to show in New York last September was shelved amid growing uncertainty at the label co-founded by the late Virgil Abloh and Milan’s New Guards Group.

The outing didn’t quite manage the radicalism of Martin Margiela’s game-changing autumn 1989 show, set on a derelict playground in the outskirts of Paris, but the sounds of local streetballers hitting lay-ups nearby could be heard before the event started.

While Abloh was born in a Chicago suburb and Off-White is headquartered in Milan, New York has always been a spiritual home court of sorts for the label, which counted Harlem rappers like the ASAP Mob among its earliest muses.

“New York has always been the first love for the brand — and America generally,” Off-White creative director Ib Kamara said before the show. “When I think of American culture and the impact it has on the global stage, it’s part of that… I think the city is happy to welcome one of its cultural global contributors back home.”

Kamara’s fourth show for Off-White — titled “Duty Free” and inspired by a “global traveller” flying into New York from Ghana, where Abloh’s parents were born — was part of a full-court press in the US market that not only accounts for 24 percent of Off-White’s business but is integral to its DNA and cultural legacy.

Key to Off-White’s founding was the union of American streetwear and Italian manufacturing. “I thought, if I can take that sensibility but make it in Italy with the quality, fit, fabric,” Abloh told Business of Fashion back in 2018. “It’s the DNA for why Off-White can sit at Barneys but also relate to a screaming Travis Scott fan.”

At the label’s peak, its simple but well-constructed t-shirts, sweatshirts, sneakers, belts and bags — plastered with high-visibility signifiers and animated by the polymathic, hyper-charismatic Abloh — made Off-White one of the world’s buzziest and most successful luxury streetwear brands.

But since Abloh’s death in 2021, amid waning demand for streetwear, the label has struggled.

A push upmarket after Abloh’s former employer Louis Vuitton (where he was men’s artistic director) acquired a controlling stake in Off-White’s trademark, compounded by weakness at New Guards Group owner Farfetch, only made matters worse.

Inventory levels soared, leading to promotions and markdowns which undermined the label’s new positioning and confused consumers and wholesale partners, some of whom, including Mytheresa and Net-a-Porter, dropped the brand entirely. Resale prices on platforms like The Real Real and StockX fell.

When current CEO Cristiano Fagnani took the helm in May 2023, Off-White was in a “critical situation,” he said, “in part due to the decision to shift positioning; in part due to the challenging situation at Farfetch.”

Off-White’s ‘Reset’

Since a lifeline from South Korean e-commerce giant Coupang helped to stabilise Farfetch in December 2023, Off-White has begun what Fagnani calls a “reset.” Key to the effort to reinvigorate the brand has been a reassessment of its positioning and a push to reconnect with consumers and partners, he said.

“It’s not like the brand was erased. It was just in a different mindset for a second,” explained Fagnani. “When you have a lot of turbulence around you, my take was to reset, and take one step back to move forward: a step back to really reconnect with the DNA of the brand but bring it forward to more creative outlets.”

Fagnani’s commitment to Off-White runs deep. As a senior marketing director at Nike, he helped develop the sportswear giant’s blockbuster 2017 “The Ten” collaboration with Abloh, who later recruited Fagnani to New Guards Group where he served as Off-White’s chief marketing officer before taking the top job at the label following the 2023 exit of former chief executive Andrea Grilli and New Guards co-founder Davide de Giglio.

To get things back on track, the brand needs to recalibrate its positioning, said Fagnani. “Two or three years ago, we went in a very stiff and steep direction to high-priced products and uber luxury. I think we are comfortable and confident to say that our space is a much larger canvas than that,” he said. “Off-White was never a luxury brand and that’s consistent with the Virgil era. it’s about cultural value over luxury craft.”

Off-White also needs to reconnect with the label’s core consumers — many of whom were alienated by its shift in direction — and become part of the cultural conversation again, especially in the US.

“Off-White is an amazing canvas to play with that exists in a powerful space between tensions: sports and luxury; the mainstream and youth culture; democracy and scarcity,” said Fagnani. But that canvas needs animating, he acknowledged. “It’s known worldwide, but it’s just a logo if it’s not fuelled culturally.”

This year, Off-White has made progress in becoming a part of popular culture again. The label dressed Usher for the Super Bowl in January and crafted bespoke looks for Doja Cat and Tinashe’s Coachella sets in April. At Sunday’s show, Memphis rap star NLE Choppa appeared on the runway in a see-through red mesh hoodie.

Next week, the label’s release of its Vulc 779 skate shoe at its New York flagship is set to come with an art exhibition by British-Nigerian artist Olaolu Slawn, who is closely aligned with brands like Corteiz and Supreme. And Fagnani is eyeing new opportunities in sports, in particular, citing a project with football team AC Milan.

He also aims to rebalance the brand’s product strategy.

“We recognize the importance and the role of customers who got into Off-White through sneakers and streetwear — that’s a consumer we nurture constantly,” Fagnani said. But Off-White’s customer base is 70 percent men and he plans to invest more in leather goods and other accessories for women.

Off-White also needs to reconnect with partners, he said. The label, which is largely a wholesale brand despite efforts to grow its direct-to-consumer channel under Farfetch, must re-engage with key retailers. Fagnani is also aiming to re-energise the brand’s once powerful relationship with Nike.

“They need to keep their Nike collaboration to keep that intermittent heat alive,” said Rachel Makar, senior director of merchandising at StockX, where most Off-White apparel sells at below retail prices save for items from its Nike collaborations, which command a premium.

Then, there’s the matter of Off-White’s Abloh-sized hole.

Fagnani called Kamara “critical” to Off-White’s future but acknowledged that no one could fill its founder’s shoes and that anyway “the next generation may already be becoming detached from Virgil and his legacy.”

Still, Fagnani believes in the continued power of the “mindset” left behind by Abloh. The charismatic creative director didn’t design clothes as much as design a global community, from New York to Accra, for those willing to challenge the status quo on everything from race to the meaning of fashion products.

“That’s what sets Off-White apart from every other brand,” said Kamara. “It’s a melting pot of amazing cultures coming together. It’s always seeking this expansion of a community that is global.”

Off-White Spring Summer 2025

Additional reporting by Vikram Alexei Kansara.