This may be Young Thug’s most creative look yet. Adidas Originals tapped the Atlanta rapper — along with Kendall Jenner, James Harden, 21 Savage and Playboi Carti — for its latest campaign video, out Aug. 10. In it, each celebrity brings Leonardo da Vinci’s Vitruvian Man to life, and Young Thug does so wearing a kimono made of trash bags.
“There were quite a few different ideas floating around for Young Thug’s Vitruvian look and the director, Terence Neale, eventually chose ‘The Emperor’s New Clothes,'” says Gabrielle de Gersigny, who worked with Young Thug and his stylist, Zoe Dupree, on the shoot. “I was briefed to make something out of transparent plastic, but it took me some time to figure out what to make. I chose a kimono for Young Thug because of his gender-breaking style and because I could see the shape of the bags would work well into the design.”
In the video, Young Thug is flipped upside down in a neon ring. De Gersigny says the plastic material was ideal for this positioning, but after spending three hours on the original kimono, she had to make a second because the stunt ropes kept ripping through the first.
Dupree says Young Thug was entirely into the kimono. “He was like, ‘It’s dope, let’s do it,'” he says. Young Thug is known to attract attention for his personal style, which, as de Gersigny mentions, often defies traditional notions of gender dressing. Most notably, he caught attention when he wore a dress by Alessandro Trincone in the cover art for his 2016 mixtape. One can only imagine what he’ll try on next.
Watch the new Adidas Originals campaign below.
https://www.instagram.com/p/BXoeXKQhSVB/?hl=en&taken-by=zoedupree
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Kendall Jenner Is Officially an Ambassador for Adidas Originals
Meet the Designer Behind Young Thug’s Gender-Fluid Mixtape Cover Look