As Ye Trolls German Ex, Investor Will Squeeze Adidas on Yeezy Probe

Matt Hickman
·2 min read

The rapper formerly known as Kanye West was seen and photographed alongside wife Bianca Censori last week leaving a Los Angeles warehouse, believed to be the headquarters for his next Yeezy launch, located next door to an Adidas store on Melrose Avenue.

Censori is also purported to be the lead designer for Ye’s next fashion line, and the two were believed to be leaving a secret fashion show in preparation for Yeezy Season 10, the musician’s first commercial effort since he was dropped by Adidas, Balenciaga and others last fall after his anti-semitic tirade and other problematic behavior.

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According to Highsnobiety, representatives for Ye, who has been banned from Twitter and no longer has an Instagram page, posted notices seeking models for an April 27 casting call that sought “models with shaved heads.”

Leaving the location last Monday, Censori was photographed wearing white tights and angels wings attached to a beige top. Ye was wearing black tights and a soccer jersey.

There’s no word on when Yeezy Season 10 will publicly launch.

Meanwhile, Adidas is still figuring out what to do with leftover Yeezy stock. Severing the relationship with Ye left the German company with more than $300 million in the hole from lost sales, not to mention the untold amount of merchandise languishing in storerooms. If those can’t be sold, Adidas is looking at a potential loss of another $534 million in revenue, Adidas CEO Bjorn Gulden said.

A shareholder lawsuit claims Adidas was fully aware of the risks posed by its association with Ye and posted fraudulent financial reports from 2018-2021, during which time the collab earned the Three Stripes brand more than $3 billion. Now, according to the Financial Times, Germany’s third-largest asset manager will attend Adidas’ annual shareholder meeting on Thursday to demand the company expose the results of its investigation into Ye’s workplace misconduct. What’s more, Union Investment head of ESG Janne Werning will also demand that Adidas “transparently clean up” the Yeezy problem, FT reported Tuesday, noting a potential overhaul to the company’s executive leadership and supervisory board.

Ye, too, has found himself in new legal trouble, as last month he was sued by employees at his Donda Academy in California for unjust termination, racial discrimination and unsafe conditions at the private Christian school.

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