Nike’s having a little fun with a bunch of space-inspired designs centered on the NBA’s All-Star game. We’ve already seen Adidas unveil the game’s uniforms and now we have Nike debuting a trio of space-inspired shoe designs.
The Feb. 17 game in Houston has garnered all sorts of space references already and Nike wanted in on the “extraterrestrial take on basketball” by offering up a “creative celebration and fictional interpretation for the game’s top players during basketball’s prized weekend.”
Nike color guru Eugene Rogers and graphic leader Erick Goto used superhero storylines to inspire the designs, creating a fictitious basketball universe led by Nike’s three elite brand representatives to provide a fun project for the design team.
The Lebron X, Kobe 8 and KD V shoes will all feature some sort of wild coloring, whether resembling that of planet’s surface, meteors or stars. Lebron James’ version has a meteor-like look, but this rock comes mostly in purple and red. Kobe Bryant’s “Ice Mamba” appearance waves in orange, while Kevin Durant’s alien-esque greenish tones offer a playful color option.
The shoe project evolved to the point where Nike has planned an entire apparel collection, launching on Jan. 23, to coincide around Area 72, the top-secret facility where these shoes take on a fictional life of their own.
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Tim Newcomb is a journalist based in the Pacific Northwest covering news, culture, sports design and entertainment. He has written on uniforms and sports logos for TIME Magazine, Sports Illustrated and more. You can follow him on Twitter at @tdnewcomb. Visit his website here.
KDub
Wednesday, January 23, 2013 at 11:02They are all hideous. Just another money grab.
ingmar66
Thursday, January 24, 2013 at 04:31I do like the KD shoe. Funky stuff! The Lebrons look very unfunky (do not like the reversed swooshes as well), despite the flashy colours and the white spots resembling stars and the Kobe's...dead ugly. I remeber Nike did an alien Roswell thing several years ago, with a funky seventies ABA flavour. That was really nice.
Sneakerhead23
Thursday, January 24, 2013 at 14:43I like the KD'S V and thre Kobe's but the Lebrons look weird with all the color on them and the backwards swoosh looks awful. But, nice design on them though
Toral
Friday, January 25, 2013 at 05:52I also like the Adidas brand, specially their qualities products, I love the color for all shoes you have posted, so cool stuffs with nice design on them though.