crooked tongues magazine News Features

It's funny that we have a habit of dissociating ourselves from shoes with local popularity. The Reebok Classic has long been a byword for man with a van, pub dwelling and casual thuggery, but we embrace those stereotypes and feel that there's way, way, way more to this shoe. All the chav talk (very, very thinly veiled class snobbery) should be jettisoned and the Classic should be celebrated as the shoe of the people. In ice white form, with icy soles and patterning beneath the sole surface, this shoe represented clean living as much as a white-on-white Uptown did for Harlem dwellers. This is a hugely significant shoe that gets sold short by cultural shorthand and new jacks who hopped on board during the dying embers of the Dunk era. Dating back to 1983 (with an anniversary fast approaching), this casual running design was never made for proper running like, say, a Paris Runner, but tapped into a fitness movement like the iterations of the Workout, focusing on soft leather, an all-round aura of ease and comfort to fuel sales.

That versatility served it well for nearly 20 years and we think that, alongside the Epic, ZX 500, 1300 and other far more serious-looking pieces from a similar era, it represents the platonic ideal of what a running shoe shape should be - something that hasn't been surpassed since. So we frequently wonder why this creation — rarely celebrated, despite the phenomenal design — doesn't get its dues as a seminal shoe moment. We'll put it down to internet era cynicism's perennial short term memory. These nubuck versions with gum soles and slightly cracked leather branding are hard. Leave that oft-vilified footprint with pride and feel the reassuring embrace of the toweling lining - the Classic lives up to that lofty name and these will be in the Crooked Tongues store shortly.