Over the last few years, Virgil Abloh’s Off-White brand has been accused on multiple occasions of stealing designs while also infringing on copyright. Despite all of this, Abloh’s brand continues to be a leader in the streetwear world as fans are always willing to cop his new threads, regardless of how derivative they might be to true fashion connoisseurs.
According to The Fashion Law, Abloh and Off-White are facing yet another lawsuit, this time from Walker Wear. WW is alleging that Abloh infringed on their copyright thanks to a brand new letterman jacket that is being sold for a whopping $2,234. In fact, WW is saying this is “a design nearly identical to Walker Wear’s storied WW XXL Athletic mark design.”
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As you can see in the images below, Abloh’s jacket bears resemblance to a crewneck that Walker Wear has sold for many years now. The brand is claiming that consumers have mistaken the Off-White jacket for WW’s work and that “Off-White and its founder, Virgil Abloh, have an unfortunate history of deriving from the creativity of other designers.” In the trademark suit, WW says Off-White has a habit of taking other people’s work and then only modifying it by three percent.
FarFetch and Saks Fifth are also being implicated in this suit as they have continued to sell the piece. Walker Wear says they sent a cease and desist months ago and it was never honored, hence this lawsuit. If WW wins, they are looking to get financial damages which will likely be the profits from the sale of these jackets.
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[Via]