Sneakerphelia
The Shoe Collecting Epidemic Hits San Jose
Story by Angel Luna

A lot a young people collect baseball cards, Pokemon cards, and Barbie dolls, but for the most part that's all become part of the past of being a collector. Today, people don't wait for the next rookie card or toy, and not to dis Barbie, but a lot girlies and boys are more focused on the next special shoe, like the next SB Dunks or MJ's, to drop then any other type of thing coming out.

Collecting kicks has hit many major cities for years, like New York in the East Coast and LA in the West Coast, and many countries like Japan, France and England just to mention a few. San Jose has been no exception to this subculture. This phenomenon is spreading faster then the bird flu, and the shoe collectors, aka sneakerheads, are growing by big numbers.

A sneakerhead is a type of person who not only buys shoes just to have them lying around their room, but is a very distinguished fellow or lady that knows their shoes the way an art collector knows their art collection. Sneakerheads don't like fake stuff, and they love to call out why the shoe may be fake.

One type of shoe that a lot of sneakerhead collect is the “SB Dunk.” The history of the dunk goes way back in the day to the year of 1985 when Nike Inc. decided to make a similar shoe to their Terminator edition. It was made mainly for college basketball teams. The dunk became a subculture icon, and morphed into the biggest and greatest skateboarding shoe ever, now known as the SB Dunk. They are sold primarily at small skate shops, and it is even difficult for stores to get supplied.

San Jose may have limited shoe resources, but guess what Juan? We have them yo! San Jo can't be compared to SF or LA, because we only have limited supplies, but we do have a couple independently owned shops like Circle A in downtown San Jose and SkateWorks in the South Side. And on the corporate side, you got your Zummies, which is at different malls all over the Bay.

Rule number one for real sneakerheads is don't buy fake. As a true sneakerhead you may be tempted to buy some really good fake shoes, or you may get fooled by the typical E-Bay shady cat that's trying to hustle you, or some rookies with some lame copies. Trust me, it happens a lot, especially if this seller uses fake pictures.

Just like any other collectable, sneaker collecting can also be extremely profitable. It may sound weird to the ears of the average joe, but shoes can go from $70 all that way to $10,000. I know your question may be, how in the world can this be possible? But the answer is easy -- supply and demand is the name of this game. The more exclusive, the more expensive. Suppliers have ways to be as exclusive as possible. Sometimes a shoe may be released exclusively for a specific country, like the “Homer Simpson Dunks” that were only released in Australia. Another way of getting a big buzz is if they release the shoes during a specific date, for example the “White Lunar Dunks” dropped on the 29 th of March 2006, in conjunction with the first solar eclipse. A “promo” is a certain shoe that only friends of the company or the designer gets, and this includes friends and family and also celebrities. This shoe is not for sale to the public and a good example of this is the new Futura FL aka ”For the Love of Money”, which sells at a starting price of $9,000. Only 24 pairs were made, and it is sort of the holy grail of shoes right now.

Another shoe that sneakerheads are talking about is the “Dia de los Muertos,” that is dropping this November. The designer, Ian Mathus, who goes by Nahual, lives in Mexico, is one of the hottest designers out there. We got to interview Nahual, the man of the hour right now for sneakerheads.

DB: Describe to our readers your shoe design style.

M: Hella firme and bizarre.

DB: What are your influences?

M: Well more then influence, this is what makes me put my self out there in the real world, when I see their work it makes me feel energetic and it makes me want to work harder so that way one day I will be right there with them…Kaws, Pushead, Neck Face, Banksy, Shepard Fairey, Andy Warhol, Diego Rivera, Miguel Calderon, Titan, and others.

DB: How do you start designing shoes?

M: First, I started wearing them and then I started understanding the brands and the difference of models, colors and the lines and all the science behind a decent shoe. At the beginning I used to wear a lot a skater shoes, after I stepped my game to Puma, Adidas, Pony and other classy kicks. I had a sick kick on but nothing out of this world, until one day I got to purchase these kicks called UBIQ model Banksy-Warhol with the signature stitched, that was the moment that I discovered what I needed. I keep collecting them and one day at that same store Vans had a show release of 20 models of a slip on that was customized by all Mexican artists, the name of the show was called the “Mecsican Style,” I didn't want to customized a vans shoe, what I proposed was for them to let me place an illustration with some plastic with some cloned Nikes with grass and metal inside a fishbowl where there was a live cactus that fed itself through a system that included the shoe, that was the start.   

DB:What's your most recent creation(shoe)?

M: The God of los Brujos Toltekas, this piece is made out of rock and plaster that has the form of a Mexican Warrior inside of the “Air Force 1” shoe. This piece was designed for Headquarters Canada and this piece is now part of this expo called “Save For Your Shoes,” where they give the artists shoes in the form of a piggybank, and are then asked to customize them in whatever way they want. The collection was added to “Sneaker Pimps”, a world traveling show, when they went to Vancouver.

 

DB: What's the story behind the Dia de los Muertos SB Dunk?

M: The thing is that here in the barrio, we like to honor our dead ones, and me being the type of vato that I am, not too young and not to old, I needed something that will fit my style, but with the characteristics of the day of the dead. So one day I just decided on designing them and the people at Nike saw them and they were really impressed because they never had a shoe that commemorated the day of the dead. We all know that we're going to die sometime and what's a better way to be in good with her then offering the Day of the Dead dunk?

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