For the Sacai Resort 2021 collection, American artist Hank Willis Thomas gave Sacai’s designer Chitose Abe permission to use the phrase “Love Over Rules” featured in his neon light installations and in a gothic font on Sacai’s new T-shirts and parkas.

Thomas dedicated the San Francisco installation of Love Over Rules to his cousin, who died suddenly in 2000; apparently the words were lifted from his last voice message to the artist.

Meanwhile, Abe worked on this collection from home. “It allowed me to think about the things I loved about past collections,” she said. This new one features many of her favorite archival fabrics mashed-up to create tank tops, pajama shirts, wrap skirts, and long, loose shirt dresses. The linings of the “Love Over Rules” jackets are lively patchworks of the different prints.

The lookbook has a “Sacai for real life” vibe; Abe wanted to portray how she actually wears her clothes: not in “full looks,” but rather with her Nike leggings or her APC jeans. That jibes nicely with our more circumscribed daily routines. Still, she’s hoping she’ll be back in Paris with her next collection. “Even if it’s just 10 minutes long, being able to create that experience and environment is really important to me,” she says. “I’m preparing so that I can if the opportunity arises.”