Nike Foamposite One 'Tianjin'
Colorway: Black/Black-Lava Glow-Lakeside · Style code: 744307-001 · Release date: February 7, 2015 · Price: $3099 · Availability: Available now
Nike has built China-exclusive Foamposites around individual cities for years, and this one goes to Tianjin, the northern port where basketball first took hold in the country in the 1890s through the local YMCA. The shell is where the artwork sits; the Foamposite upper is a single poured piece with no panels or seams, closer to a canvas than to a conventional upper, and the whole of it was used. Lotus flowers and koi scales run across the surface, both drawn from Yangliuqing, the woodblock print tradition the district on Tianjin's western edge is known for, and both carrying meanings the design leans on rather than explains. Pink picks out a Lunar New Year greeting at the heel and on the insole. The model itself is Penny Hardaway's from 1997, which gives the release its second layer: a shoe originally sold on being futuristic and unornamented, handed over entirely to traditional ornament. It went on sale in February 2015 through Nike accounts in China only and never entered the North American release calendar, so pairs reached most of the world through resale.