Sitting down to lunch at the Mercer Kitchen in New York not long ago, Virgil Abloh checked off the most recent stops on the circuitous route that had led him to where he sat: from Tokyo to Copenhagen, back to Tokyo, to San Francisco, to Los Angeles, to Chicago, and then here.

At 6:30 the next morning, he would leave for Puerto Vallarta, in Mexico, for another project whose details remained, by necessity, hazily defined. It seemed to involve work on an album, most likely with Kanye West, for whom he has worked since 2002. Mr. Abloh now has the title of creative director for Mr. West.

“Working on the record, off the record,” he said.

Mr. Abloh’s progress in culture tends to follow these international and often unspecifiable paths. Trained as an architect and an engineer, he left a firm in his native Chicago to join Mr. West, and has since refashioned himself as an all-purpose cultural guru, whose work includes art-directing Mr. West’s tours and merchandise; his own frequent D.J. appearances; his clothing store, RSVP Gallery, in Chicago; and a handful of fashion collaborations and collections of his own making.