Here’s How Sneakers Are Taking Over Fashion Week

In the midst of a designer exodus and one of the weakest luxury apparel markets in recent history, many wondered if this September’s New York Fashion Week could still keep its luster. Yet, where others saw weakness, some sensed opportunity. As an army of journalists chased fashion shows all over New York City, a single idea drew them (and the eyes of the world) back again and again to just one location: sneakers. For three days straight, New York Fashion Week orbited around Nike’s “OFF CAMPUS.” Located on Wall Street, the pop-up installation offered programming, events, and most of all, a closer look at “THE TEN,” this fall’s highly-anticipated Virgil Abloh x Nike collab. The media circus surrounding the sneakers themselves only intensified throughout the week, with rumors about who had pairs dominating conversations everywhere from Nautica x Lil Yachty to the front row of Tory Burch. By week’s end, the noise surrounding “OFF CAMPUS” had drowned out all but Raf Simons’ sophomore show at Calvin Klein, a critically-acclaimed collection that showed the same night as KITH Sport, a sneaker-fueled spectacle that was as much about the clothes as the celebrity shoe collabs. Read more at Highsnobiety.