When an Artisanal Fashion “Dinosaur” Meets Reebok's Weirdo Sneaker
Boris Bidjan Saberi is not shy to call his new Reebok sneaker weird, in our short 25-minute-or-so conversation he does so many times. But he’s not saying it in a pejorative sense, it is the weirdness of the Reebok Instapump Fury that got him interested in the shoe in the first place, over twenty years ago.
“I really loved this model because it had a weird construction, the sole was in two pieces, it almost [felt] a bit Japanese,” says the German-Persian designer when recounting his first interaction with Reebok’s Instapump.
Certainly, compared to the footwear offerings at the time, Reebok’s Instapump Fury was an anomaly: A chunky sneaker with the middle part of the sole missing, a complex construction of overlapping panels, and a pioneering pump system in the place of laces. Even now, thirty years later, it’s a novel footwear concept.
That’s part of the reason why it’s stood the test of time, there truly is no other sneaker quite like the Instapump Fury. And Saberi has been drafted in to celebrate its longevity.
This isn’t his first rodeo. Ten years ago, he was asked by 24 Kilates, a since closed-down sneaker store next to his Barcelona office, to create a limited edition colorway of the Instapump Fury for its 20th anniversary. Now that the shoe has hit its third decade in existence, Saberi’s interventions extend beyond the colorway.
This latest collaboration, created together with Reebok’s high-end LTD line, has a more chunky sole unit and its streamlined paneling has been reworked. Saberi describes it as “a little bit more aggressive.”
And once the whole shoe is complete, it’s given the distinctive color treatment Saberi’s sneakers are known for: Dipped into dye so that each shoe has a unique patina.
“It’s an interaction where a sneaker with a lot of technology ends up being an artisanal treated experiment. No two sneakers are exactly the same,” says Saberi. “The rubber of the airbags came out super shiny, it looks a bit like candy. It's really weird, really nice.”
(That word, weird, springs up once more.)
The original plan when Saberi was approached for this collaboration was to turn the Instapump into a skate shoe — “It ended up too complicated. I think Reebok still is working on that,” says Saberi — but its final form is still designed to have a skateboarding feel.
The shoe's lived-in look is inspired by skate crews of the ‘90s and, in the accompanying clothing collection, reinforcements are added to the knees of the trackpants and elbows of the hoodie, areas that wear out with regular skating.
Saberi, a skater in the ‘90s and early 00s, created the patterns for all the clothes in-house in his studio, shaping their volume based on how they fit on his body. This is the tactile way he always works, through in-hand experimenting. “I'm a dinosaur, really,” he says. “I work very directly and very physically, on my own body.”
Saberi’s self-confessed dated practices ground his work at his eponymous brand, where handcrafted detailing and unconventional proportions are commonplace, but they also shine through in collaborations through his 11 by BBS diffusion line.
The Reebok LTD x 11 by BBS collection, set to be released on March 31, combines elements of his old-school artisanal craft with Reebok’s wonderfully weird sportswear.
