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NIKE, Inc. and Virgil Abloh Book ICONS

Source: Nike / Nike

Nike will soon be releasing a book called ICONS, published by TASCHEN and which documents “The Ten,” the company’s 2017 collaboration with Off-White founder Virgil Abloh. The initial project saw the Louis Vuitton Creative Director take apart ten iconic Nike shoes, such as the Air Jordan 1 and the Converse Chuck Taylor All-Star, and put them back together with different arrangements.

“The foundation of my practice isn’t nearly the end result — it’s rigor and process of the logic. The archive is the paper trail of those artifacts,” said Abloh of his deconstructive/reconstructive approach to the collection’s development. “The ICONS book is, in a way, the only revealing lens to understand that the catalog of the 50-plus Nike shoes I have designed are in my mind ‘one shoe.’ One story.”

NIKE, Inc. and Virgil Abloh Book ICONS

Source: Nike / Nike



Five of the iconic sneakers were grouped as “Revealing,” and the others were classified as “Ghosting,” with each title explaining the manners in which the sneakers’ inner workings were put on display. “These 10 shoes have broken barriers in performance and style. To me, they are on the same level as the sculpture of David or the Mona [Lisa]. You can debate it all you want, but they mean something,” Abloh said at the time of the original collection’s development. The results were so popular that Nike even released a 258-page PDF file called “TEXTBOOK,” which also shares a lot of the ideas that spawned each shoe’s transformation.

ICONS will initially be sold at Black-owned bookstores and independent outlets before being made available through SNKRS, Off-White, and Canary Yellow on January 22. TASCHEN.com and other global retailers currently will have it available for sale on February 5 for $70.

Get a better look at a few pages of the book in the gallery below

NIKE, Inc. and Virgil Abloh Book ICONS [Detailed Photos]
NIKE, Inc. and Virgil Abloh Book ICONS
9 photos