Kanye West has accused Gap of failing to fulfill its “contractual obligations,” and demanded a judge throw out the clothing brand’s $2 million lawsuit against him.
Gap was sued by commercial company Art City Center in October 2022 due to alleged changes made to a downtown Los Angeles building by Ye, who was utilizing the space for his Yeezy clothing line while partnering with Gap. Gap began a lease with Art City Center in April 2021 and the lease ended in March 2022. Court documents showed at the time that Gap said they’d pay $104,666.67 per month for rent and $8,333 for parking, but the agreement stated that they cannot make any changes to the space without prior approval.
However, “numerous, significant, unapproved modifications” were allegedly made to the building,” most likely by Ye, so the clothing brand demanded he pay the total $2 million sum.
According to court documents obtained by RadarOnline, West has denied all allegations of wrongdoing in the case, but Gap claimed the deal had a provision that stated the brand could not be held liable for any claims brought due to Yeezy’s acts or omissions.
“Gap’s claims fail because the June 25, 2020, Strategic Agreement between Gap and Yeezy Supply (Strategic Agreement”) is invalid or voidable,” Kanye responded in his statement. “Many of the modifications complained of were in fact beneficial to the Premises and all were carried out for the benefit of the Strategic Agreement with Gap. Gap must have anticipated that modifications such as were made to the Premises are typical for this type of business.”
Ye argued the modifications to the building had “improved” the property, and gave an example of “an ADA ramp” he built, adding he never would have signed “a lease requiring no modifications to the property used for a pop-up store” if he had known that was part of the contract. The Donda hitmaker denied all wrongdoing and said Gap should pay his legal fees.
This lawsuit was initially brought forth after Kanye terminated the partnership between Yeezy and Gap over a series of alleged contract violations in September 2022. That following April, adidas was also sued by investors over their Yeezy partnership with Ye and claimed that the company was allegedly aware of the risks associated with continuing a partnership with the controversial Chicago star prior to his anti-semitic outbursts last year.
The lawsuit reads that investors in the company noted in a 2018 annual report that adidas disregarded the concerns with their partnership with Kanye West by “generally alluding” to the risks “rather than stating that the company had actually considered ending the partnership as a result of West’s personal behavior.”