story

Gomu Gomu

Air Max Plus x One Piece

The creator of One Piece, Oda, is one of the greatest artist and storytellers of our time. You can see in his characters and his story the level of maximalism and fantasticalness. 

When I'm in Japan, I feel the same thing. It's overwhelming but energising at the same time. That approach is one that we tried to inject within these designs. 

Being able to touch every part the design and add details across the whole shoe. As a collective group, we were trying to figure out what would be the best model to celebrate the idea that Devil Fruits are Nikes.

The Air Max Plus has these whimsical concentric waves that almost read like manga lines. Like a black outline of drawings. We then used that as a canvas to bring in the line work of Oda's Devil Fruits.

The normal Air Max Plus stops there, but we really wanted this design to transfer across everything. To recreate the cage and create something that has never been seen before.

At first we got this pattern trial. This is freaking sick. It's what we call a clown shoe. It's not quite the colours. This was an earlier version where we used this repeat fill. It didn't feel like it was hand drawn, so we really wanted to inject more energy into that. 

Choosing a base material that felt gummy, like a juicy strawberry. We really liked the idea of taking a bite out of the shoe. *That's good.* So, we have a little bit of a chomp out of the shoe. Every little detail mattered.

To work on a shoe in a collection for two years and then to come here and see it live is a gift. 

When my mind goes to designing, I'm thinking of the most extreme potential solution. Taking the concept as far as I possibly can. We really hope we created a product and experience that fans will love. 

To see it come to life in this way is freaking amazing. The attention to detail that Oda brings, as a Nike designer we try to do the same thing with our designs and the stories that we build and tell.  

I think there's a correlation in terms of the depth that both the artist and the brand pushed to create.

Nike x One Piece | The Design

featuring Yuchung Chen