The history of the 'modern' day sneaker can be date back to the Mid 70s in The Bronx, New York.
Basketball was responsible for sneaker culture hands down hiphop made it become ‘staple style’ - Bobbito Garcia, Editor in Chief, Bounce from the playground
- People began wearing sneakers for the way they looked and matched their clothes instead of choosing them for functionality.
- B-Boys are credited with the popularity of the sneaker today as the ones that were comfortable to dance in were really ‘standardized’ as bboy gear. (Stereotypes, like how football players are conceived to wearing varsity jackets)
RUN DMC ARE CREDITED WITH HIPHOP X SNEAKER CULTURE. THREE BROTHERS WITH A MANAGER DRESSED ON STAGE HOW THEY DRESSED ON THE STREET AND CAUSED AN INFLUX WITH THE POPULARITY OF SNEAKERS AND NOTABLY THE ADIDAS SUPERSTAR
which they popularized by wearing them all the time. They even released a song called “my Adidas’ in 1986 and it reached number one on the U.S charts obviously raising Adidas’s Popularity. They noticed that everyone in their concerts whether in North Carolina or Chicago or Georgia or even South Carolina all wore Superstars like them so their manager decided that they wanted to make money off of Adidas. They called an Adidas spokesperson to a concert of theirs and during the concert they told the crowd to lift their Adidas when they were performing their song, "My Adidas". The spokesperson saw that hundreds of children were carrying superstars so therefore the spokesperson corresponded with the Adidas HQ in Germany and cemented a deal with RUN DMC for 1 million dollars.
- This was the first time a person or group not involved with sports had a sneaker endorsement
- After DMC many groups such as fresh jordan with files and ll cool j with trooper
The "Boom"
-The footwear industry boomed when Michael Jordan got signed to Nike as a young rookie.
Nike were fined every time that Mike wore the black and red Air Jordan 1's due to a uniformity rule that imposed shoes had to include white but they kept allowing him to wear them causing a stir in the hiphop and fashion community all over the world.
-They capitalized by making a series of ads that made them more desirable to the youth and community. After he lead the bulls to the playoffs and inevitably became the greatest of all time, everyone wanted to be like mike and the rest is history…
-Proof - During the early 90’s One in every 12 people in America had a pair of Air Jordans
Bib Chi Style
"Michael Jordan' in his Air Jordan 1s
Just For Kicks. Film. Directed by Thibaut Longeville. New York : Come Chantrel, 2005.
” Sneakerheads (documentary) Part 1/3 - YouTube .” YouTube - Broadcast Yourself. .http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yTYk9WlCMao&feature=related (accessed January 22, 2012).
