Balenciaga Quietly Quits Yeezy, Ye Purchases Mid Parler Social Media Site, 'Drink Champs' Removes Ye Interview
No word from Adidas...yet
Balenciaga has quietly quit Ye and Yeezy, not with a public statement but with removal of references from social media. Most prominently, Vogue and Balenciaga have removed the opening image of Ye walking the runway from their websites. As well, the brand has removed Yeezy Gap Engineered by Balenciaga from the Balenciaga website as well as stocklists including Farfetch and Luisaviaroma. Balenciaga creative director Demna Gvasalia, who is known to have a close relationship with Ye, hasn’t commented.
According to a Twitter user who follows Yeezy quite closely, the Yeezy Gap product was removed from Balenciaga two weeks ago, and was likely removed from wholesale accounts within the past few days.
This morning, it was announced Ye had purchased Parler Technologies, a mid social media platform akin to Twitter that’s popular among U.S. conservatives. While the terms of the deal haven’t been disclosed, the Nashville-based Parler has raised about $56 million to date. In an interview with Reuters, Parler CEO George Farmer said talks about the deal with Ye began shortly after Paris Fashion Week.
Notably, Farmer is married to Ye’s new best friend, Candance Owens, who infamously was in attendance at his Yeezy fashion show and was photographed wearing a “white lives matter” shirt at the event.
“Drink Champs” has removed its latest interview with Ye from YouTube, an episode fill with antisemitic tropes. Meanwhile, show host N.O.R.E. called into “Ebro in the Morning” to apologize.