adidas Stan Smith 'Core Black'
Colorway: Core Black/Cloud White/Core Black · Style code: BD7452 · Release date: March 7, 2019 · Price: $194 · Availability: Available now
More colorways: adidas Stan Smith 'Core Black' (M20327) · adidas Stan Smith 'Core Black Green' (GZ6314) · adidas Stan Smith 'Core White Grey' (GY0028) · Adidas Superstar Stan Smith 'Core Black' (FX7578) · adidas Stan Smith Freizeit 'Core Black' (JQ5838)
Most Stan Smith colourways start from white; this one starts from black. The upper is Core Black leather from toe to collar, and the shoe's usual green accent is gone. In its place, Cloud White does the contrast work: a white leather counter wraps the heel, white laces run up the throat, and the tongue label prints in white. The sidewall carries a Trefoil cut out of the leather rather than printed on it, a small detail that reads clearly against the dark hide. The result is a tonal court shoe that keeps the low cupsole profile and clean toe box the model is known for while dropping almost every colour cue.
The shoe wears a name it did not start with: Horst Dassler initiated the design, it carried tennis professional Robert Haillet's name by 1965, and after Stan Smith signed with adidas in 1973 it carried both Haillet's name and Smith's portrait for roughly five years, until the 1978 rename. This Core Black pair released on March 7, 2019. For anyone who wants the shape without the white, it is one of the more restrained options adidas has produced: no green tab, no colour beyond black and white, just dark leather with pale punctuation.