Denim Tears founder Tremaine Emory has resigned from his position as creative director at Supreme, as confirmed by a series of Instagram posts published to his personal account Thursday.
In those posts, Emory accused the brand of systemic racism, and also claimed the company had lied to the press.
“Supremes statement in the @bof article is a lie to hide the systemic racism that lies deep within supreme and almost all white Owned corporations,” Emory wrote in the post. “I wanted to work with supreme to change these things.”
Instead he said he was told that he was “racially charged, emotional, and using the wrong forum” when he tried to address these issues in a meeting.
“That’s why I resigned,” he said.
VF Corp. didn’t respond to Fashion Dive’s request for comment ahead of press time.
Emory spent two seasons with the VF Corp.-owned brand, and at the time of his hire in 2022, Complex magazine noted that Emory is “committed to forefronting a meaningful message as streetwear becomes more intertwined with hype and resale value.”
Yet Emory said on Instagram that his vision did not align with the management at Supreme, particularly in relation to a planned but canceled collaboration with artist Arthur Jafa.
“So over the last few weeks after resigning I fought tooth and nail into the 25th hour with c suite of supreme to align with them on a statement to the press explaining that l left supreme because of systemic racial issues the company has from the treatment of the arthur jafa collab to the make up of the design studio that has less than 10% minorities working when the brand is largely based off black culture,” Emory said.
He added that after resigning, he met with James Jebbia, Supreme’s founder, and that the head of human relations was also at the meeting, along with a representative from VF Corp. listening via Zoom. Jebbia “agreed with all of my points and said he’s gonna change supreme,” said Emory.
“James admitted he should have talked to me about cancelling images from the jafa collab because one of the few black employees( who ironically has quit supreme before I did partially because of his treatment due to systemic issues by the supreme…his words not mine) in the design studio didn’t think that we should be putting out this collab,” said Emory, adding “James agreed there should have been discourse about the project with me being that I was the creative director and I’m black.”
VFC acquired Supreme in 2020 for $2.1 billion, adding it to a roster of brands including Vans, The North Face and Timberland.
