After 40 years and 40 million pairs * we’re still loving and (obsessively) buying them.
We’re talking about Adidas Stan Smith, the classic tennis shoe named after the two-time Grand Slam tennis champion, an American tennis player who was active between the end of the 1960 and beginning of 1980.
The design and form of this sneaker, that was launched in 1971, has basically stayed the same since it was introduced: white leather upper and laces, three rows of perforations that should symbolize the three ordinary external stripes and a sketched picture of Stan Smith on the tongue of the shoe (not necessary).
Through the years new colors, collaborations and versions appeared and it was last year that the world’s first leather tennis shoes was re-born after nearly two years off the markets: in 2014 Kayne West and Pharrel Williams were been caught wearing them and Gisele has eve been photographed naked in a pair.
* In adidas’ comprehensive annual report for 2014, which consists of 268 pages of the company’s performance in the last year, it was revealed that 40 million pairs of the vintage tennis sneaker have been sold since its debut!
Lia Zaccariotto
