Everything You Missed from “Virgil Abloh: The Codes” Exhibition at Paris Fashion Week 2025

The Virgil Abloh Archive, in partnership with Nike, debuted its first European “Virgil Abloh:The Codes” exhibition at the infamous Grand Palais venue. The exhibition kicked off on September 30th, on what would have been Abloh’s 45th birthday, and concluded shortly after on October 9th at Paris Fashion Week 2025. Curated by Chloe and Mahfuz Sultan as well as Abloh’s widow Shannon Abloh, the exhibition showcases almost twenty years of design and experimentation through an astounding  20,000 archival prototypes. 

Who was Virgil Abloh?

Abloh was a trailblazer in a multitude of artistic disciplinaries including fashion, design and music. Son to Ghanaian immigrants and raised in Illinois, Abloh first started as a student of architecture and engineering, and overtime became interested in fashion design. One of his priorities was to make fashion and creation accessible to the everyday person. He rejected the title of “designer” and instead preferred “maker”, incorporating “the norm” into his designs by dismantling and reconstructing the mundane. He established the “3% rule”, a creative principle which highlighted how real and impactful innovation can be made by simply altering 3% of an existing idea. For example, he released “Evian x Virgil Abloh” in 2020, a perfect representation of modifying an iconic and compounded design by minor elevation. This emphasis on the beauty of process inspired Abloh to start archiving his own work when he was a teenager. In later years, he went on to become the founder of “Off-White” and creative director of menswear at Louis Vuitton, and to this day is considered one of the most significant creative figures of the 21st century.

Inside “Virgil Abloh: The Codes”

This exhibition is an expanded version of “Virgil Abloh: The Codes” 2022, which was initially presented in Miami. The European edition goes even further into Abloh’s archives, showcasing one of his core design principles, “codes”. According to the exhibition's introductory text, “Virgil was drawn to designs that revealed their inner workings, showing off their joints and seams rather than concealing them”. Visitors could see different prototypes like a leather handbag with “sculpture” written on it, and of course numerous Nike shoe designs with access to choices behind things like branding elements and typography. There were even more symbolic displays like Abloh’s personal USB sticks and mixtapes in glass vitrines which is a nod to the importance of artistic transparency. The exhibition even included an immersive experience with visitors being able to explore Abloh’s actual Louis Vuitton office. Naturally a plethora of Abloh’s collabs with artists, designers, and athletes were also on show including a reissue of “Virgil Abloh x Braun” collaboration and a French translation of Larry Warsh’s book “Abloh-isms”. Both were available for purchase at Rotonde Clemenceau. 

Impact of “Virgil Abloh: The Codes” 

The mission of the Virgil Abloh Archive is to inspire other artists through the revelation of process, and most importantly to keep Abloh’s ideas alive. “Art imitates art” and through exhibitions like “Virgil Abloh: The Codes”, creativity is spun in an endless loop with no definitive stop. Abloh was known to say, “Everything I do is for the 17 year old version of myself”. And that sentiment can be seen in his work for young people, specifically the young Black community. He established the Virgil Abloh “Post-Modern” Scholarship Fund to mentor Black fashion students and in general championed the next generation of “makers”. 

Written by Alex Kelleher (alex_kelleher_) 

Edited by Niall Carey (Niall.030)