COLE HAAN REINVENTS THE DRESS SHOE WITH DEBUT OF GRANDREVØLUTION
American lifestyle footwear and accessories brand Cole Haan has unveiled GrandRevølution – a dual gender collection that brings the innovation associated with performance footwear to dress shoes.
Traditional craftsmanship meets modern engineering with the GrandRevølution men’s collection. Running-shoe inspired GRAND.ØS energy foam provides responsive cushioning, while a lightweight torsional arch supports and steadies each step. The achilles and tongue padding generate ready-to-wear comfort right out of the box. A fully synchronized motion outsole and flex welt infuse the dress shoes with the flexibility and moisture control benefits of a performance sneaker. Laser-perforations found on the Washington Grand Laser Wingtip Oxford upper offer a contemporary take on a traditional wingtip.
To coincide with the launch and further capture the spirit of invention and innovation, the new “A Revolutionary Feeling” campaign features entrepreneurial revolutionaries, sharing their companies’ progress towards a re-imagined future. The campaign focuses on the lives and stories of these individuals, with an inside look at what drives their work. In addition to Scott Patt of Cole Haan, the campaign includes creative revolutionary Mazdack Rassi of MILK and career revolutionaries Alex Cavoulacos and Kathryn Minshew of The Muse.
“With the launch of GrandRevølution, we have dramatically reinvented the design and construction of dress footwear,” said Jack Boys, chief executive officer at Cole Haan. “We have re-engineered traditional dress silhouettes in a way no dress footwear company has since the invention of the Goodyear Welt in 1869. You must see and feel it to believe it.”
“To say, ‘they don’t make them like they used to,’ would be an understatement,” asserted David Maddocks, chief marketing officer and general manager of business development. “This represents a comprehensive revolution in dress shoemaking – we have re-engineered, re-invented and re-imagined these products to deliver comfort one can immediately feel in a luxuriously-crafted, elegantly-engineered, fashion-forward shoe.”
Scott Patt, vice president of design and innovation at the Cole Haan Global Innovation Center in New Hampshire, added: “When we designed the GrandRevølution collection, our goal was to infuse the modern benefits of performance footwear inside the beauty, elegance and craft of traditional men’s oxfords and women’s pumps. The result is a wearing experience that can only be described as mind-blowing. We’ve created a 360˚ reinvention of the everyday dress shoe engineered with the GRAND.ØS benefits of cushioning, lightness, flexibility and breathability.”