Brand: Off-White™ x Pioneer
Buy: Off-White™, Farfetch, and select Off-White™ flagships already offer the apparel; the DDJ-1000-OW controller will debut globally in limited numbers via Pioneer DJ.
Editor's Notes: Virgil Abloh is a man of many talents, having explored the realms of fine art, architecture, industrial design, and (duh) fashion within the past decade alone. Often, he hybridizes his creative interests, dropping merch at his art exhibits or creating "sculptural" utilities. Throughout it all, music plays a pivotal role, made especially clear by his partnerships with Pioneer DJ.
The two first linked in 2019 for a not-for-sale collaboration, wherein Abloh displayed exclusive transparent CDJ-2000NXS2 and DJM-900NXS2 in his "Figures of Speech" exhibit (yet another crossover!). Now, they're back for a line of goods that you can actually purchase, including co-branded apparel and a bespoke DDJ-1000-OW controller.
Citing the all-caps conceit of "SOUND ENGINEERING," Off-White™ and Pioneer concocted their special DDJ-1000 DJ with the intent of unifying both companies' recognizable ethos. To whit, the new controller borrows its layout from the two devices — the CDJ-2000NXS2 and DJM-900NXS2 — that Abloh featured in his "Figures of Speech" show.
Pioneer says that both of those flagbearers are deemed club-standard by pro DJ's — with zero DJ experience, I personally can't confirm or deny that but I can say that the flashy orange accents, colorful light-up buttons, and script co-branding are nice touches.
There's also an array of "SOUND ENGINEERING"-themed garms to accompany the drop, encompassing white T-shirts finished with fancy lettering, black layers laden with green prints that glow in the dark, and a washed-out denim jacket that has a little bit of both. A thematic bag also appears in the campaign imagery but doesn't appear to be currently available.
"I wanted to take this opportunity to bring together technology and human interaction," Virgil Abloh said in a statement. "Both music and fashion, in my opinion, are these intense forces that have the unique power to bring people together while letting you make your own statement all at the same time."
"Virgil’s capacity to connect a myriad of art forms is a fearless display of unlimited creative potential," affirmed Yoshinori Kataoka, president and CEO AlphaTheta Corporation.
