It’s 2025 and Saucony is an plain drive in sneaker tradition.
For greater than a century, the sportswear model has developed footwear that individuals swear by and websites commonly embrace on their best-of year-end lists. Now, Saucony is layering elite vogue onto its legacy and reaching wider audiences within the course of.
“I do not know if lots of people believed we might have the second we’re having,” displays Jason Faustino, Saucony’s International Director of Vitality and Collaborations. “However we’ll proceed on and… simply hold working our race.”
Jae Suggestions leads the pack. Since his preliminary collab with Saucony in 2023,the Grid Azura 2000, the Bronx designer and rapper has grow to be synonymous with the model. His releases promote out immediately, which incorporates his fifth (and most up-to-date) collaboration, the Jazz 9 ‘I like you, however I’m busy.’
Saucony has fashioned strategic partnerships with different famend streetwear manufacturers as properly.
Relatively than reinventing the wheel by creating a brand new mannequin, they’re tricking it out. Earlier this yr, Saucony tapped London-based sneaker retailer Footpatrol to place their spin on the Omni 9 and Brooklyn clothes retailer Color Plus to remix the Matrix. Within the coming months, Saucony will drop collabs with the property of New York Metropolis icon Keith Haring and 3sixteen, amongst others.
To be taught extra about Saucony’s slate of collaborations in 2025, Advanced spoke to Faustino, who has an enormous hand in selecting the model’s companions.
This interview was edited for concision and readability.
Saucony has been making footwear for greater than 100 years. How has introducing collaborations developed the model’s id?
I strategy [collaborations] with the technique of chatting with an viewers we weren’t already chatting with. For 100 some-odd years, it was the runner. When Saucony Originals developed within the ‘80s, it was extra of a sneakerhead client or somebody that likes retro footwear.
Our collaboration companions have allowed us to talk to a a lot wider viewers in several components of tradition, whether or not it’s vogue, artwork, music, or varied different issues not so particular to working or sneakerhead tradition. Even when the [collaborations] do communicate to these cultures, which is clearly on-brand for us and a part of our technique, they nonetheless faucet into new communities that align with our values.
If you’re evaluating a possible collaborating companion, what are the important thing qualities that Saucony appears to be like for?
I am going rather a lot off my instinct of who’s a superb match and really feel. There must be that mutual alignment. Aside from that, I take a look at their group. I do not say that in a cliche manner, however I often see a group that is genuine and has an actual ardour for what that model stands for, whether or not it is what Jae Suggestions was doing with hats or what Minted was doing of their varied areas.
As a result of Saucony is positioned within the market as extra of a challenger model, now we have to pop up on folks’s radars in a brand new and thrilling technique to even get their consideration. So I am taking a look at folks and types within the sense of have they got the potential to try this? Are they on a trajectory to trigger pleasure in the event you’re asserting a partnership with them? Will folks go, “Oh, I ponder what’s coming right here.” There must be that stage of intrigue.
I’ve been impressed by Saucony’s means to search out up-and-coming manufacturers, see the expertise and potential, after which benefit from a partnership, which will get me to Jae Suggestions. He’s been a constant collaborator with Saucony over the previous few years. What do you suppose has made that partnership so profitable?
As a fellow New Yorker, it’s straightforward for me to take a look at Jae and know the vitality locally is there. It is even simpler to take a look at the product he is labored on, significantly within the hat house and know he has a particularly savant eye with regards to coloration combos and placing coloration palettes collectively.
However what I realized actually shortly is that he’s such a superb particular person. He felt like one in every of us, like somebody you actually root for past the truth that you want his work and that he is from New York and has a chip on his shoulder. It is how he takes care of his household and buddies, how he takes care of you.
We may have simply been a transactional sneaker companion that’s simply making the footwear that he wish to put on the market on this planet, however it wasn’t like that in any respect. It was like brotherhood, and he is fashioned these relationships with many individuals on the model now. We have got such a household vibe and the best way that we create should not be undervalued.
Moving into the Jae Suggestions Jazz 9 sneakers, they’re tremendous vibrant. Then there’s the “I like you, however I am busy” embroidered over the heels. What was the inspiration behind all the colours and particulars that went into the shoe?
Jae’s entire aesthetic leans vivid and daring. He likes to say that we come from the period the place we like to interrupt necks within the sense that what you are sporting, significantly in your toes, you are hoping somebody turns round and goes, Whoa, what are these? It is making a press release.
These Jazz 9s have been impressed by a hat that he purchased at Disney World that had a pinwheel design with a unique coloration on every panel. Even when he is pulling from exterior influences, Jae all the time infuses his signature colours, these recognizable pinks and purples, plus you’ll discover that coral pop on the only real.
Typically our rapid reactions is like, Wow, how do [those colors] work collectively? After which the pattern comes again and it is extremely harmonious. You do not even see these coloration combos often on this planet. He is bought, and I’ve mentioned it earlier than, a genius-level eye for placing coloration collectively. It is actually one thing.
I do not know what it’s. Possibly it is the brown and blue colorway or the leather-based and mesh supplies, however that Footpatrol Omni 9 collab makes me need to go tenting. I do not even like tenting. What was the general imaginative and prescient for that collaboration?
[Footpatrol’s] temper board had numerous outside imagery. It introduced a mixture of outside themes: reptiles, amphibians, army vibes, all tied along with their fuel masks brand, which already leans utilitarian. So yeah, it’s a rugged shoe, however with these sudden vivid pops of coloration.
They executed it fantastically. There’s actual depth within the supplies, and the colour story is wealthy. One other partnership the place there’s such synergy, I type of simply allow them to prepare dinner. They’re veterans. They have been doing this a really very long time too, so that they know what they’re doing.
The Saucony x Color Plus Matrix collab is tremendous distinctive, with the standout characteristic for me being the bushy suede higher and the tongue. How was that characteristic of the collab determined? Is there a narrative behind it?
Jordan [Page] was very adamant in regards to the Matrix coming again for Saucony, and when it did, it made sense for him to work on it. He was impressed by Y2K (the period the unique Matrix launched), its techy and futuristic nature, but in addition from this human urge to reconnect with nature. That pressure between tech and earthiness is an enormous a part of his artistic course of, and even his private mindset.
That’s the place the earthy coloration palette is available in, and the bushy suede provides texture and depth, it’s tactile and pure. Jordan loves when a product modifications over time, evolves with put on, and adapts to completely different appears to be like relying in your temper. That versatility is intentional.
We have seen a sneak preview of the Keith Haring x Saucony collab, I consider it is a ProGrid Triumph 4. What are the precise options or design nods that you’re most enthusiastic about with that shoe?
For those who’re from New York Metropolis, you realize Keith Haring is a legend. At some point our designer mentioned to me, “Have you learnt he is from Kutztown, Pennsylvania?” And I used to be like, “Get out of right here. That is the place Saucony was based.”
We began digging into it and located items of his paintings that he had accomplished in colleges and round Kutztown. That connection felt actually particular, it made the collab really feel much more significant.
That’s so cool. What number of colorways will there be?
Two. The primary one, launching this Might, is impressed by the colourful nature of affection—a celebration of Keith, an brazenly homosexual artist, and the spirit of Delight itself. His work bursts with daring, joyful colours and highly effective imagery of individuals coming collectively. The primary drop actually radiates unity, vitality, and sweetness.
The second launch drops this November, timed with the New York Metropolis Marathon. It carries a deeper, moodier tone. We have been impressed by these unforgettable clips of Keith within the subways, sketching in chalk on clean, black advert areas. These moments felt so uncooked, rebellious, and artistic and so they actually caught with us. He typically bought arrested for it, however the imagery was electrical. So, we leaned into that visible: a black-based shoe with hanging white strains, echoing Keith’s chalk drawings and the gritty, creative pulse of NYC’s ‘80s subway scene.
Folks don’t essentially affiliate denim with trainers, but Saucony and 3sixteen are collaborating. What sparked this partnership? How will the model’s monochromatic denim designs be infused right into a Saucony shoe?
I’ve identified Andrew [Chen] for years. Again earlier than I even opened Further Butter, he performed an enormous half in serving to me get began. I used to be only a child attempting to make connections within the business, and he actually seemed out for me. We have stayed in contact through the years, he’s all the time somebody I’ve saved an eye fixed on.
At one level, I observed he had gotten into working, and I believed that was actually cool. I’ve all the time loved seeing folks begin their working journeys. It’s thrilling to look at, like, will they keep it up? Will they fall in love with it? I like seeing that obsession for working take maintain.
So I reached out and mentioned, “Hey, I’m over right here at Saucony. I like that you just’re on this journey, and I’d be comfortable to assist you.”
Will precise denim be infused into the shoe?
There’s truly no denim on or within the shoe. Let’s say you get a pair of 3sixteen denim. It’ll look a technique while you purchase it, however over time, it actually modifications and evolves and turns into uniquely you. They needed to [represent that] by way of the materialization and the colour palette of their sneaker with us. They need to present the evolution of the fabric, how the colour and dying modifications, as you evolve. The footwear pair very properly with denim and communicate to denim in these elements, however it’s not denim itself. It is impressed extra by a clean canvas.
A typical theme amongst a handful of Saucony collaborators is a connection to New York Metropolis. What’s it in regards to the metropolis and the model that you just really feel goes hand in hand?
New York Metropolis is the epicenter and birthplace of sneaker tradition. The 2 are fully synonymous with each other, and it is solely pure that we’re so influenced by New York Metropolis. It is sensible that it comes by way of in numerous completely different footwear partnerships.
We have got Paris Style Week in June. Are you able to tease how Saucony will make its presence felt there?
We have got lots of people cooking up some good concepts, and we’re working with our collaboration companions on it, which I am enthusiastic about.
The great thing about it’s we’re coming naturally collectively in the identical vein that our model marketing campaign is chatting with run as one. Nobody’s forcing us to ensure that the efficiency aspect and the life-style aspect are put collectively equally. It is simply transferring in that course.
In a single-to-two sentences, how would you describe Saucony’s model id in 2025?
I’d say Saucony’s model id is an underdog who’s beginning to win, – shocking folks and shaking issues up within the business. I’m unsure everybody believed we might have the second we’re having proper now, however we’re right here, and we’re going to maintain going. We’re going to only hold working our race.