"Weekend Reading" is a weekly rundown of our favorite stories from around the web.
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A Conversation With Virgil Abloh & Takashi Murakami on Art & Collaboration
"Earlier this year, Japanese artist Takashi Murakami collaborated with multi-hyphenate creative Virgil Abloh on an art exhibit at London’s Gagosian Gallery. Titled “Future History,” the exhibition will be on display until April 7. The works, produced in Murakami’s Tokyo studio, sees some of their signature symbols and practices meld together to create a unique synergy."

via: Highsnobiety

What Riccardo Tisci Means For Burberry
"In hiring Riccardo Tisci, Burberry has tapped one of the most dynamic designers in recent times. In many ways, the fashion landscape that we find ourselves in today was predicted by Tisci. During his reign at Givenchy, he foresaw several of the key issues and trends that are playing out today. From the rise of luxury streetwear and designer trainers, to increasing racial and gender diversity and using social media as a tool to smash orthodoxies, Tisci did it all first. He was even the first to embrace Kanye as a serious fashion figure and, in turn, the Kardashians, designing Kim’s wedding dress and giving Kendall Jenner her first Paris catwalk moment. In Burberry CEO Marco Gobbetti, he has a businessman who is on his wavelength. Both Gobbetti (who worked with Tisci at Givenchy before running Céline and then Burberry) and Tisci understand luxury, but also how modern fashion intersects with technology and the new generation of young customers. Tisci, who graduated from Central St Martins in 1999, unveils his first collection at London Fashion Week in September. An exciting new era beckons. Here’s what to expect."

via: British Vogue

Raise Your Son to Be a Good Man, Not a ‘Real’ Man
"There are times in every man’s life when he will be asked by other guys to betray his own values, his own ethics, his own idea of what it means to be a good man in the name of proving that he is a real man. Proving that we are “real men” to other men will push us — no, require us — to sometimes do the wrong thing, fail to stand up for the little guy, behave dishonorably."

via: The Cut

To Survive, Streetwear Must Abandon Sexism
"Streetwear as a culture is built on an unwavering sense of community, leveraging a grasp on authenticity that the fashion industry has become desperate to capitalize on. At the core of this is streetwear’s unique ability to appeal to men in ways that have eluded mainstream fashion. Where traditional brands have long cultivated an air of unattainable luxury marketed primarily toward women, streetwear has done the exact opposite."

via: Hypebeast

Dapper Dan Talks Gucci Partnership, Dressing Harlem’s Notorious Gangsters, and Getting Busted by Sonia Sotomayor
"Inside the new atelier of Dapper Dan, the tailor whose 125th Street shop defined the high-flying look of Harlem’s cocaine ’80s—and who’s now back in business, thanks to a Twitter controversy and an unlikely new arrangement with Gucci."

via: GQ Style

As Fashion Moves Towards a Seasonless Model, Has 'Seasonal Inspiration' Become Obsolete?
"For those who pay attention to such things, the ritual of fashion designers announcing their seasonal inspiration — regularly collected in slideshows on sites like WWD and The Cut, outlined in show notes and assessed in runway reviews — can be entertaining, often pairing well with a snarky aside about the lofty ambitions of creative types. But, when designers are most successful in contextualizing their frames of mind by sharing what motivates them creatively, it can help us understand the ways in which fashion reflects what's happening around us in a broader way, giving what we wear an elevated sense of importance and lending a bit more relevance to the Fashion Week rigamarole, if not the entire industry."

via: Fashionista

Oprah Is the Original Celebrity Influencer
"But before Instagram or reality TV shows on Bravo, a 64-year-old woman of color was the original mastermind of galvanizing audiences across the country to purchase items and support causes she endorsed. While it’s impossible to put an exact dollar figure to Oprah’s impact, she has been responsible for the shopping choices of millions of Americans over the span of four decades, whether it’s the books you bought because of the little icon on the cover carrying her endorsement or the Christmas presents you chose because she mentioned it on her show. Her advocacy for all things shopping might have started with her TV show, which boasted 48 million viewers, but it’s since extended to other entities like her television network, OWN; her magazine; and its website."

via: Racked

Many Accusations, Few Apologies
"In fashion, a world where sex is part of the landscape and the definition of acceptable behavior has long been blurry, there are still few apologies.vMore often, there is an aggressive response to accusations, leaving colleagues and business partners in a state of doubt—or denial."

via: The New York Times

The Dirty Industry of Fast Fashion Is Causing an Environmental “Emergency"
"The $2.5 trillion fashion industry is the second-largest user (pdf) of water globally, according to the United Nations Economic Commission for Europe (UNECE), noting that producing one cotton shirt requires 2,700 liters of water—”the amount a person drinks in 2.5 years.” The agency also estimates that one in six people worldwide works in a job related to fashion, an industry whose supply chain has a reputation for unsafe conditions, child labor, and other exploitative practices, especially for girls and women."

via: Quartz

The Beginning of the End to the $500 Billion Counterfeit Fashion Industry
"High-end fashion brands have tried to tackle the problem in their ways. However, they have not gained much from their efforts. A brand will stand up and fight for itself only, but counterfeiting is not a problem of one particular brand. It’s a plague that has been affecting the entire fashion industry and their consumers for several years now. Recently, there have been an influx of start-ups trying to tackle this problem, but Group Project made use of the blockchain technology in a unique way to solve a unique yet real problem. While other blockchain projects are focused on creating new forms of currency, Group Project has addressed a serious issue and come up with a solution that has the potential to become an industry standard."

via: Irish Tech News

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