From a very young age, as a teenager, I was into hip-hop and

When Virgil Abloh, the visionary designer, said, “From a very young age, as a teenager, I was into hip-hop and skateboarding and all those things that were akin to a kid in the '90s. All those things are what resulted in clothes,” he was not merely describing the origins of his creativity — he was revealing a philosophy of creation. In these words lies the spirit of a generation that found beauty not in the palaces of the elite, but in the rhythm of the streets. His statement is a hymn to the alchemy of culture, the way ordinary passions, humble beginnings, and raw experiences can be transmuted into art that changes the world.

Abloh’s words carry the weight of authenticity. Born to Ghanaian immigrants and raised in the suburbs of Chicago, he grew up not in the ateliers of Paris but in the pulse of the 1990s youth culture — an age of turntables, asphalt, rebellion, and imagination. The world around him was not curated but lived. Hip-hop, with its poetry of survival and self-expression, taught him rhythm and voice; skateboarding, with its defiance of limits, taught him freedom and motion. These worlds, often dismissed as subcultures, became his temple — and it was from these temples that he drew the sacred patterns of his designs. Thus, what “resulted in clothes” was not fashion in the shallow sense, but translation — the transformation of life into form, of identity into fabric.

In Abloh’s time, fashion was often bound by tradition — ruled by European heritage, detached from the pulse of modern youth. But he shattered those walls by insisting that art and culture are one continuous conversation. When he founded Off-White and later became the artistic director at Louis Vuitton Men’s, he carried into those grand houses the language of the street — graffiti, sneakers, slogans, and the casual poetry of everyday wear. His work declared that the ordinary could be extraordinary, that the T-shirt could be as noble as the tuxedo. In this, he stood among the visionaries of history — those who turned what was common into what was eternal, who proved that greatness is not born in privilege, but in perspective.

To understand the depth of his message, one may look to Leonardo da Vinci, who once studied not only anatomy and science but also the flight of birds, the play of shadows, and the curve of water. Like Leonardo, Abloh saw patterns in the overlooked. He drew inspiration not from fashion magazines, but from album covers, skate videos, and concrete walls. He understood that every culture contains the seed of creation, and that art is not built by imitation but by fusion. His designs were bridges — connecting the luxury of high fashion with the pulse of youth, the classical with the street, the West with Africa. In this way, he did not simply design clothes; he designed belonging.

The lesson hidden within his words is timeless: that one’s roots — no matter how humble — are a source of power. Abloh teaches us that the raw materials of greatness are already within us, waiting to be recognized and shaped. What he discovered in hip-hop and skateboarding was not merely style, but identity — the courage to say, “This is who I am,” and to build from that truth. The same spirit that drove a young DJ or skater to defy convention is the spirit that later drove him to redefine fashion. In this, he reminds us that creation begins not with imitation, but with authentic observation of one’s own world.

And yet, there is humility in his words. Abloh does not glorify fame or mastery, but connection. The things he loved as a child — music, motion, friendship — remained at the heart of his craft. His genius was not that he left his origins behind, but that he carried them forward. To “result in clothes” was to let those early passions continue to live, reshaped by time but never forgotten. In this, he speaks to all creators: that the world does not need perfection, but honesty made visible.

So, O listener, take this wisdom to heart: do not reject the roots that made you — refine them. Let the things you loved in youth become the foundation of your art, your purpose, your life. The rhythms of your childhood, the streets you walked, the dreams you dared to speak — these are the threads that can weave greatness. For true creation, as Virgil Abloh taught, is not about escaping your origins, but about elevating them into meaning.

Thus, the teaching endures: art is the echo of one’s own becoming. Every passion, however small, can become a language; every influence, however ordinary, can become divine. And when we create from truth — as Abloh did — we do not merely design things; we design a world where the self and the soul stand visible, proud, and timeless.