etnies keep us on their toes with their special releases every year. We never know when they're set to drop, but after the 20th anniversary celebrations of '06, Sole Technology head honcho and friend of Crooked, Mr Pierre Andre has instigated some interesting rehauls, with his original pro model, the Senix, as the subject. Environmental concerns have been part of the gameplan for a while now, and the 'Drinking Age' collection wore it's eco credentials on its sleeve (If we're being specific, on it's box). The festive PAS 22 collection added some madcap colours as well as green intent.

For June 5th - World Environmental Day, etnies have teamed with Parisian boutique Colette (aka. Your favourite retailer's favourite retailer) to release five very special Senix Low remixes, bringing it all together in eyecatching style. Forget some of the more half-hearted attempts to ride the hydro-electricity wave of ecological goodwill. These are the first shoes from etnies that can boast carbon neutral status, and from the deliberately gaudy to more minimal block colours, each makeup carries its own conscious theme.


Pierre kindly took the time out to talk us through the Sacre Green collection's genesis, executions and concepts.

Obvious question to start - how did this collection come about?

It came about ten years ago, with the office being in a building that uses a lot of solar energy and recycled materials. Ultimately, I realised that if I really wanted to move the needle I need to influence the 'influencers'. I wondered how I could do that. At Sole Tech there's a lot of influencers, but I was thinking even further than that. One of the projects I was involved in was the documentary, 'The 11th Hour' with Leonardo DeCaprio. I wanted to influence Colette because they're one of the most influential boutiques in the world from the trend and fashion side. With them, it seemed like it would be a good fit, so in 2006, I started to show them some of the things I was working on. We were doing clothing that was recycled, and then I realised there was a lot of things to learn. When I was talking with them more and more, it seemed like there could be a project. One of the projects we worked on first was the Skate Study House, where we took recycled skateboards and turned them into furniture.

That was a cool project.

Sarah told me she wanted to do a whole month based on the environment. I was like, "Wow! We're getting there!"

It feels like minds are a little more open after 'An Inconvenient Truth' and the current carbon footprint fixation.

Yeah, exactly - we're in the eco age, or ecological age, where we used to be in the ice age, or in the industrial revolution. Under the leadership of Obama, we need to embark on a movement to instigate big change. Back to the origins of this project, we decided to create a carbon neutral shoe, which would be the first carbon neutral etnies shoe. In this collection there's a lot of materials at work - vegetable tan leather, organic compounds, water based glue, nickel based eyelets - an important part of it for me is that we need to be more transparent going forward. You see nutritional content on a bottle of water - we want to know what we're putting into our body, how about what we wear on our bodies? So, with these shoes, like the ones I've been releasing every year, it carries the transparency facts on the box - it lists what's in the shoe, what's in the upper, in the outsole, in the packaging and how much energy it uses to make the shoe - for instance, it takes 3 kilowatts, how can we get this energy or CO2 emission down to zero? My goal with Sole Technology is to be carbon neutral as an entire company by 2020. I 'm working toward it, but I'm not there.

One way of being as carbon neutral as possible at the moment is offsetting, but there's a lot of questionable offsetting in the marketplace. We researched on how to be legit, and on one of my trips I went to Costa Rica, and I met with the President - Oscar Sanchez. He showed '11th Hour' in his country - I told him my plan to go carbon neutral with the company by 2020 - he told me he was going to go carbon neutral by 2021 with his entire country! I said, "What the heck?" - I couldn't believe it. He told me that he'll do this by planting a tree per person, and as I was thinking about it I found out that these trees are very healthy, because they come from the rain forest - those are the ones that capture the most CO2. As I was thinking about this Colette etnies collection, I decided I was going to offset the CO2 we're creating by making the shoes is to plant trees in Costa Rica, the country is amazing - one thing I discovered is that over there they have tree farms. Instead of cows, some farmers farm trees. I decided to work with them and plant some trees in their farm for the Sacre Green project.

Is there seeds in the outsoles and boxes of these shoes?

Yes. On the box, one of the things I'm trying to to do is alongside recycled card and tissue, is get some sunflower seeds in there, you can plant it in your garden. I'm not sure how much sun there is in England...

We get a couple of weeks a year. What's your take on some other brands and their green initiatives? Some of it has seemed a little half-arsed so far.

We have to be careful of 'greenwashing', like brainwashing - when we did 'The 11th Hour' I was sceptical of Leonardo - I interviewed him for an hour before I agreed to do the film with him. For me, from skateboarding to the environment, skateboarding was about being self-critical - skaters always want the real thing, the pure thing - not the fake thing. A lot of people are marketing green products but the company just might not be green. Calculated our footprint, and one of the biggest contributors was manufacturing our shoes and packaging. Half our CO2 was coming from making the shoes - 18% was from packaging. We are moving some of our factories from the South of China to the East side of China, where they use hydro energy instead of cold energy. By doing this, we can reduce our CO2 by 20%. The companies that know what they're doing are the ones that do an ecological footprint survey first, so they fully understand, rather than just green product. I'm trying harder. I want to show people that this isn't out-of-reach.

Did you specific epiphany that made you want to go into the green side of things feet first?

I think I had an epiphany at the turn of the millennium. I was skateboarding outside, and having trouble breathing. Skating by the beach or skating in the mountains, I always felt better. I held our first contest in the Alps - about 200 pros came, and we had a great time - I think one of the reasons was that the air was so fresh. It's kind of like like going to Vegas - you feel good because you've got those extra options!

Freedom of choice can be intoxicating.

Then I went to China and the sky was grey, I realised that the sky used to be blue. The pollution created this grey sky. I have a friend in Colorado and I visited here home - it ran on solar power and her car run on vegetable oil. She told me that she was getting the oil from restaurants. And it clicked right there - we could use oil for transportation and it would be beneficial for the environment and better for humans without their war over it. And we wouldn't have to bring it in from far away.

Can you see this approach 'trickling down' into every Sole Technology release in the future? Obviously, this is an extreme approach...

We're doing this one because I love the idea, and as an example of what you can do. It's promoting what they're doing in Costa Rica with the tree farming, I mean it's a Third World country. We can offset what we do, providing we do it with the right people.

Sometimes where well-intentioned funds go is anyone's guess.

It has to be regulated. With Costa Rica, the government is obviously heavily involved.


You mentioned the relationship between Colette and yourselves - is there some kind of French mafia running this industry?

Ha ha! The French mafia? I grew up skating in Europe and a lot of my time was spent living in Paris. I think it's a mutual respect. We're trying to do things differently.

Plus I remember you mentioning talking with Yvon from Patagonia about ecology and manufacturing - he's obviously a French-Canadian...

Yeah, I talked with him, and that was a while ago. I talk with many people, English, Italian...but, we have a reputation for pro-thinking.

It's my own conspiracy theory.

I think there's something in the culture that's revolutionary. Even getting rid of the monarchy.

Plus the student riots in '68...

Even up to the present day, the Ed Banger guys are doing their own thing.

I read an interview with Pedro Winter where he talks about upcoming projects with you guys.

Yeah, Daft Punk, Justice, DJ Mehdi and the rest of them are shaking up the industry. There's things going on between those guys, and Colette and etnies that almost seem like they're fate.

Shifting to the aesthetics of the shoes - you seem to have stripped them of the Senix's panels and represented them in stitches instead.

The world is coming to a direction where we'll be taking away the things we don't need. What we did was take my first pro-model with etnies and deconstruct the whole design - stripping it to the bare minimum.

It's interesting that in trying to strip down the shoe, it's a lot more 'on-trend', and brings the Senix up to date. One of the main stumbling blocks in ethical shoe design is that intent outweighs aesthetics, whereas a slimmer look benefits these shoes.

The white patent leather model is more dressy, I wanted to make it so you're on the grass all the time.

For another makeup, I really admire the American Indians - they used only what they needed and had no property. They believed that land should be owned by no one, and with their light footprint, I wanted to represent this, and bear in mind that the name etnies comes from 'ethnicity' - like a tribe.

I remember some logos using that ethos back in the day.

Yeah on the first shoes, back in the '80s. Here, I used bamboo as a material on one, plus hemp on the upper of another one with Indian motifs on the outsole. For another design, the green one - it's vegetable dyed full grain leather. I like faded colour. Then there's the patchwork one, the crazy one...

Which reminds me of some old freestyle skate outfits...

Exactly! The construction is patch - the factory has a recycled material section. It's stitched together. That's a lot of work. The factory are hating me right now! Hating the concept!

How long does a project like this take from start to finish?

It's not the only thing I do everyday, I have to run a company - I have a lot of things going on y'know? The journey for me is pretty quick. I used to do every line back in the day - five brands. Each line in a week. I've always had my nose on the shoes. Growing up skating I had my eye on where the board was going, I guess that helped. Skating you want to improve and create new tricks.

Pretty much every creative person I know is an ex-skater of some sort.

Skating is about defying convention. When you finish something, you're already moving along on something else. It definitely comes from my life skateboarding.

What's the story with the release of these shoes and numbers?

They'll be launched at Colette first on June 5th, which is World Environmental Day. And there'll be just 12 pairs of each shoe. I tried to make it very unique.