Tremaine Emory has officially left his role as creative director of Supreme. Emory joined Supreme in February 2022 after VF Corp acquired the company for $2.1 billion. The reason for his departure has been stated in a leaked letter of resignation reported by Business of Fashion. Emroy lists his reasons for departure primarily due to Supreme senior management’s “inability to communicate.”
Emroy cited the cancellation of Supreme’s planned collaboration with artist, Arthur Jafa, as indicative of the problem.
The letter notes that Supreme management never offered “full visibility for the reasons behind” the cancellation of the Jafa collaboration. This caused “a great amount of distress as well as the belief that systemic racism was at play within the structure of Supreme.”
Supreme released the following statement in response to the leaked letter:
“While we take these concerns seriously, we strongly disagree with Tremaine’s characterisation of our company and the handling of the Arthur Jafa project, which has not been cancelled. This was the first time in 30 years where the company brought in a creative director. We are disappointed it did not work out with Tremaine and wish him the best of luck going forward.”
In a separate post on Instagram, Emrot called out Supreme for encouraging him to put out a statement saying that “a racist incident didn’t happen” during his tenure.
“Supreme’s statement in the BoF article is a lie to hide the systematic racism that lies deep within Supreme and almost all white-owned corporations,” wrote Emory.
Emory will focus on his own label, Denim Tears, in the meantime while he will continue his consulting work with brands like Stüssy to Dior.
