Vans Sk8-Hi 38 DX 'Anaheim Factory'
Colorway: Red/Black · Style code: VN0A38GFUBS · Release date: September 2018 · Price: $2832 · Availability: Available now
More colorways: size? x Vans Sk8 Hi 'Dawn of Punk' (VN0A38GF03Y) · Vans Sk8-Hi 38 DX 'Anaheim Factory - Black Leather' (VN0A38GF103) · Vans Sk8-Hi 38 DX 'Anaheim Factory - True White' (VN0A38GF104) · Vans Sk8-Hi 38 DX 'Anaheim Factory OG - Black Spider Web' (VN0A38GF1JJ) · Vans Sk8-Hi 38 DX 'Anaheim Factory - Color Mix' (VN0A38GF1JK)
Vans numbered its shoes before it named them. The Authentic was Style 44, the Era 95, the Old Skool 36, the high top 38: catalogue references that predate the marketing names most people use, and that the company still puts on the versions built closest to their originals.
Anaheim Factory is the same instinct applied to construction. The Van Doren Rubber Company opened in Anaheim in March 1966 making shoes on site and selling them straight over the counter, and the Anaheim Factory line reproduces the details of that period rather than the current specification: the shape of the tongue tag, the printed logo panel, the foxing tape around the midsole, the heavier canvas.
The 38 DX is the high top under that treatment. This version splits the upper between canvas and suede in red, adds quilting at the collar and an UltraCush sockliner for comfort the 1970s shoes never had, and sits on a vulcanised midsole over the waffle outsole.
It released in September 2018 at $65, a price that would have been unremarkable in almost any decade of the brand's existence.