Unpaginated 20,7 x 15 cm Language: English Paperback Publisher: Sneaker Freaker 2009
The fifteenth issue of Sneaker Freaker, the Melbourne-born, independently run title billed as the world's only international sneaker magazine. Founded in 2002 by Simon "Woody" Wood — originally, by his own admission, as a scheme to get free shoes — it grew out of the DIY punk-fanzine tradition and, by this mid-2009 instalment, had matured into the definitive print voice of global sneaker culture while keeping its irreverent, self-made spirit intact.
Woody's editorial pins the issue to a precise moment of flux. It opens on the "futuristic" turn then gripping footwear — the Back to the Future Nike Mag as the most talked-about sneaker in the game, its influence traced through the Hyperdunk, the first Nike Air Yeezy (Kanye's stated run of 9,000 pairs held up as a new kind of hype economy), Supra's buckled hightops and Android Homme's Propulsion. Its centrepiece is a 20-plus-page guided tour of fashion's invasion of sneaker culture — Gucci, Prada, Lanvin, Chanel and the Kanye West × Louis Vuitton project — capturing the exact instant the two-way street between street culture and haute couture jammed solid, with lo-fi sneakers improbably winning the race at the same time. Released across four collectible covers (one glow-in-the-dark), it is a sharp snapshot of the industry at a genuine turning point.
