Kiko Kostadinov x ASICS Gel Delva 1 'Caramel'
Colorway: Caramel/Marzipan · Style code: 1013A041-200 · Release date: November 9, 2018 · Price: $759 · Availability: Available now
More colorways: Kiko Kostadinov x ASICS Gel Delva 1 'Cool Mist' (1013A041-100) · Kiko Kostadinov x ASICS Gel Delva 1 'Forest Green' (1013A041-300) · Kiko Kostadinov x ASICS Gel Delva 1 'Murasaki' (1013A041-500) · Kiko Kostadinov x ASICS Gel Delva 1 'Tai-Chi Yellow' (1013A041-750) · ASICS Kiko Kostadinov x ASICS Ilargi FF 'Carbon' (1203A982-001)
November 2018 put the Delva 1 in shops in this brown treatment, and it is the version that best explains what the Kostadinov partnership was for. ASICS traces back to Onitsuka, founded in Kobe in 1949 and later named for the Latin phrase anima sana in corpore sano (a sound mind in a sound body), and its collaborations had mostly been exercises in recoloring old running models. Kostadinov, who began working with the company in 2018, was instead given room to draw new ones.
Caramel is the warmest reading of the Delva 1's construction. The upper is textile, cut soft, and a separate mesh cage is pulled over it so the striping shows through in pieces rather than sitting on the surface. In brown the two layers sit close in tone, which flattens the shoe into a heavier, more boot-like profile than the paler pairs manage.
Underneath is unmodified ASICS running equipment: a heel stabilizer, GEL in the midsole, FLYTEFOAM and DUOMAX. The $300 asking price was a fashion price attached to a performance sole unit, which is more or less how the whole series was positioned.