In the last decade, white T-shirts made the transition from simple, if sometimes expensive, wardrobe staple to sought-after It Item, one that’s more about status than comfort and versatility. Black designers are responsible for some of the most famous T-shirts in recent history. In 2013, Kanye West teamed up with A.P.C., to release a plain white cotton T-shirt titled the “Hip Hop Shirt” that cost $120. It sold out instantly. Virgil Abloh’s, the founder of luxury streetwear brand Off-White and the men’s artistic director of Louis Vuitton, fashion career started with a T-shirt: His first-ever line, Pyrex Vision, was made up almost entirely of deadstock Hanes and Champion T-shirts. The designer would screenprint them with the words “Pyrex” and “23” (for Chicago Bulls star Michael Jordan), and mark them up $200 to sell to the upper class. According to Riot Material , this was a deliberate act by Abloh to test how the idea of “cool” can increase the value of otherwise valueless items like a cotton T-shirt. In lower-class neighbourhoods, he’d give them away for free.