Virgil Abloh was born on September 30 , 1980 , in Rockford , Illinois , to Ghanaian immigrant parents . His mother was a seamstress and his father managed a paint company . From his mother , he learned how to sew . Abloh was raised in Rockford , where he attended Boylan Catholic High School , graduating in 1998 . He graduated from the University of Wisconsin – Madison in 2002 with a Bachelor of Science degree in civil engineering . He received his Master of Architecture at the Illinois Institute of Technology ( IIT ) in 2006 . When Abloh was attending IIT , there was a building on campus under construction designed by the architect Rem Koolhaas ( who had also worked on runway collections for Prada ) which helped spark his interests for fashion . without taboos , makes us discover an artist such as we would like to see more and more , that is to say complete , and the word is not enough to express it . While studying architecture , he designed T-shirts and wrote on fashion and design for a wellknown blog , The Brilliance . Abloh first met popular musician Kanye West while working on his designs at a Chicago print shop . After graduating from university , Abloh interned at Fendi in the same class as rapper Kanye West in 2009 . Placed in the company ' s Rome , Italy o ce , the two began a collaborative relationship . During his work with the rapper and designer , Abloh caught the eye of the Louis Vuitton CEO , Michael Burke .