It was a sneaker lover’s delight this past weekend as two highly desired shoes released.
Nike released two of its most anticipated shoes of 2018: The Air Jordan 3 Retro “Tinker” released Saturday in select retailers and online at Nike.com while the Sean Wotherspoon’s Air Max 97’s released March Monday online at Nike.com as well as in select retail stores.
The Air Jordan 3 retro “Tinker” busted out the box in full force and is quite the eye catcher. The shoe sold for $200.
This release has caused the most commotion thus far among Jordan lovers, according to sneakernews.com.
They were first seen during Justin Timberlake’s Super Bowl performance. The original design utilizes the classic white/white cement colorway with the white out Nike swoosh on the side. The most recent release called the “Tinker” is a reflection of designer Tinker Hatfield’s original sketch of the shoe, and 30 years later Nike is finally bringing that idea to life in a “Fire Red” colorway that also features the Nike Air logo on the heel, and black Nike swoosh on the sides.
The Sean Wotherspoon Air Max 1/97 is pure eye candy. This is Nike’s first-ever corduroy shoe.
It is dark green, brown, teal, pastel purple, pastel yellow with a denim strip backing and velour tongue that comes with a sticker patch. The shoes also feature the ubiquitous Nike swoosh patch and a smiley face along with two extra laces – one purple pair and one teal pair. It’s quite versatile in its looks.
“For me personally, I think corduroy gets better with age,” Wotherspoon said when interviewed about the design process by nicekicks.com.
A vintage lover, Sean is the owner of ROUNDTWO, which started off as just a Nike iD design before blowing up.
Left to Right (Erik Thoms and two other winners of the pre-release) 3 out of 5
“I want my design to win and I want everyone to realize how corduroy is the s**t,” Wotherspoon said.
Although they were released, that doesn’t mean everyone had the chance to get them. Nike gave App members the option to hold their spot a day before the release so that when the shoe dropped shoppers could immediately have them in their bags, and confirm their purchase. Other shoppers had to wait outside of retailers and try their luck.
Small sneaker retailers like Kith, APB and private sellers received the shoe.
APB Tallahassee held a pre-release party for the Sean Wotherspoon Air max’s Sunday evening, where participants were asked questions and could win a ticket to purchase the shoes on the release date.
Erik Thoms a local resident of Tallahassee was among the crowd and her luck was up
“the guy asked what date was the original air max released, and everyone kept saying 1987, 1987 .. but he said the date, and when he picked me I said the date which is March 26 1987 and I won the shoes”.
For Erik the toughest things in life just seen to come easy. For this two-time winner. Not only did she luck up on the Wotherspoons’, but she also won the Jordan Tinkers the day before.
They were too fresh not to wear out of the store.
There was a total of five winners at the pre-release and the store raffled away the remaining of the shoes at the official release, there were 11 winners on the release day.
The Official release was a lengthy process. Between 12 p.m. – 4 p.m. the store handed out raffle tickets. Participants returned at 5 p.m. to trade in their original tickets for another ticket, wrote their size or a random size on the ticket and placed the ticket with the size on it in the ticket bag.
Store manager James said “A lot of people wanted the shoe, people were lined up outside camping out the night before, and I gave out a lot of tickets, even to homeless people.”
Everyone had a shot at winning, some of us are just luckier than others.
Stephen a sophomore FSU Student, skipped class for the release
I asked him why he loved the shoe Stephen replied “because the shoe is badass”
He continued “I love the colorway and the style, they go with everything, the corduroy is creative and I’m a big fan or Air Max 1’s and the single sole look, I just love the style of the shoe.”
Both amazing shoes have left a hard trail to follow. For more upcoming shoe releases check out sneakernews.com