adidas Y-3 Rhisu Run 'Black White'
Colorway: Black/Black/Footwear White · Style code: FX7261 · Release date: July 7, 2020 · Price: $175 · Availability: Available now
More colorways: adidas Y-3 Rhisu Run 'Black' (FU8504) · adidas Y-3 Rhisu Run 'White' (FU8505) · adidas Y-3 Rhisu Run 'Trace Khaki' (FX7262) · adidas Y-3 Rhisu Run 'Multi-Color' (FU9180)
Y-3 launched the Rhisu Run in December 2019, and its foundation was not new: the shoe sits on the sole unit of the original adidas Ultraboost, a platform that had been in production since 2015 and was by then thoroughly familiar. What Y-3 changed was everything above it.
The upper starts as mesh and is then reinforced with smooth leather and suede overlays, a material combination that reads closer to a dress shoe than a runner and gives the shoe structure where a knitted Ultraboost has none. It is the label's habitual move: keep the adidas engineering, replace the surface with something that belongs to a fashion house.
This black and white version came in July 2020. Later that year the model returned in khaki for autumn, which is when it drew most of its attention, but the earlier monochrome pairs are where the leather and suede against mesh is easiest to read.