This year, Nike celebrate the 20th anniversary of the iconic Air Max 95. We take a look at the shoe’s heritage, looking at designer sketches, words from the designer, original photography, even an X-Ray of the shoe!
The performance running shoe changed the game. It’s neon yellow accents and attractive silhouette was unlike anything seen on the market before.
The man behind the shoe was designer Sergio Lozano, whose persistence and strength saw the project turn from simple drawings on paper, to a beautiful finished product.
The first design was initially not well received according to Lozano. “The first concept review for the Air Max 95 wasn’t a success across the board, some people thought it was good and others didn’t like it at all.”
Thankfully, due to a supportive team, his vision was completed and the silhouette joined the Air Max family. “There were some great champions who stood behind the idea and without them the shoe wouldn’t have been made”.
In the 90’s, Nike Basketball was rising to new levels of popularity and Nike Running had to do something special to keep up. The Air Max 95 project was an effort to rediscover the same energy that surround the line in the 70’s and 80’s. “The running team wanted to mix things up a bit, they wanted to take a risk. I guess I was that risk” Lozano recalls.
Just 4 years into his career at Nike, and having only worked on tennis, training and ACG lines, Lozano was asked to lead the Air Max 95 project. Lozano found his inspiration for the shoe before he even knew it himself. “I was looking across the lake out into the trees and I began picturing the process of rain eroding the earth and thought it would be interesting if the perfect product was unearthed by erosion” Lozano recalls. He drew a quick sketch, of the erosion’s which were then left for many months in a drawer, until a brainstorming session for the Air Max 95 reminded him of his vision.
Using the drawing as inspiration, Lazano and the team set off on creating the Air Max 95, however one question was still unanswered for Lozano, “I remembered something Tinker Hatfield used to always bring up while working on other projects, he would say, ‘Okay, so that’s a great design, but what’s your story?’” His answer came from an anatomy book where Lazono drew the comparison between the human body and the product’s design, The Air Max 95 prototype then incorporated the human ribs, vertebrae, muscles, and skin as design features for the shoe.
The silhouette’s unique aesthetic almost caused it to never get off the ground. “There were lovers and haters. But you know you’re on to something when you get that kind of emotional reaction” The first design didn’t have a swoosh logo which was a cause for concern. “We figured Nike was pretty recognizable as a brand and that the design could stand on it’s own. Why did we need it? We already had visible air and we were debuting forefoot visible air on top of that.” Because of the shoe’s design, there wasn’t a natural position to put the swoosh without disrupting the aesthetic. Ultimately, the swoosh was stamped high up on the ankle where it “acted as punctuation” according to Lozano.
Now the design was completed, the next decision was a colourway. Initially, the colours were meant to be functional for runners, “in Oregon, people run when it rains, they run on trails, and after the first five miles their shoes look beat and I wanted to disguise that a bit.”
Against others advice, Lozano chose grey as one of the feature colours. “I was told that grey didn’t sell and took that as a challenge.“ The base of the shoe was dressed in Black and Dark Grey to hide dirt. This dark sole then transitioned into lighter shades higher up the shoe. Neon yellow was then applied to honour Nike’s racing kit, which still features bright colours on track spikes and cross-country shoes to this day.
Lozano and his team battled against the odds to get this shoe produced which, upon its eventual release, quickly became synonymous with music movements around the world. ,
The Air Max 95 and Air Max family was hugely popular with youth culture which helped grow the franchise significantly. At 20 years old, the Air Max 95 still continues to inspire designers today and is a testament to Lozano’s persistence and creative vision.
The post The Anatomy of Air: The Air Max 95 appeared first on The Sole Supplier.
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