Celebrating an all-time classic silhouette, in a new Varsity Red colourway we have Paul Skillen depicting his most cherished moments growing up playing basketball and now sharing his love for the game and AJ 11’s with his two children.
For me, the Air Jordan 11 is one of the most defining moments, opinion splitting, beautiful shoes, ever created, period.
Tinker Hatfield said Michael had asked him for ‘something shiny’ and he delivered a shoe with a nylon and patent leather contrasting upper, fully translucent sole and a carbon sole plate. This shoe was developed during Jordan’s basketball hiatus and nearly ‘never was’ as Nike was looking to stop the signature models at no.10.
From a sneaker culture point of view, it broke trends, many people thought they are ugly because they were so different, many thought they were revolutionary and combined style with class, iconic moments like Boyz II Men all wearing them at the Grammys to Jordan wearing them in the original Space Jam meant this silhouette was seen by more than just Bulls and NBA fans!
But the moment they were revealed to the world was the best, he wore them in a loss – game 1 of the Eastern Conference Finals against a young Shaq and Penny Magic team. Nick Anderson for the Magic had stolen the ball from Jordan in game 1 saying “no.45 ain’t no.23, I couldn’t have done that to no.23”. The next game everyone had clocked these new shoes, MJ put no.23 back on, he was fined for both the trainers and the jersey change $25,000 and dropped 38 points and at this moment I think the basketball world was like, “HE’S REALLY BACK”.
Personally, this shoe holds a lot of significance, I was 15 going into my last year of high school when I saw this shoe on court first during the 1995 playoffs.
I was really into basketball playing at every single opportunity and sneakers was a massive part of that.
When I was in my last year of high school, when asked what I wanted to do for work experience, (and told the NBA wasn’t an option), I said there was a sports shop in the local city which had opened only six months previously and I would like to work there. The manager of that shop was a 6 foot 7”, basketball, playing, local league hero, and power forward for the Wyndham Wizards, who I often chatted with at the weekend in store. I did my week of work experience which even included some after work; Basketball at streetball court in the city and my friendship, with this person began.
About six months later, my friend Mike had been promoted from his local store as manager to the Nike store inside JD on Oxford Street in London (this was a few years before Nike town arrived in London in 1999). I had told Mike about my love for the new Concords which dropped in November, and he had explained that the quantity was so limited, and they were selling out so fast Nike had made the decision to continue to sell out in stores in the USA before incurring a load of shipping cost to send them worldwide. A little while later (around March), my mother got a phone call from Mike saying that they had super limited quantities, but he had put aside a pair of size UK9 for me for my 16th birthday. Me and my mother shortly after embarked on a trip to London on the train to collect them.
It’s one of my latest memories of me being a kid and doing things with my mum or dad, as from that age onwards I was independent and would do those types of things on my own.
The Air Jordan 11 Cherry carries such a strong colourway because they are a retro colourway (2001 Varsity Red) but in the OG silhouette rather than the lows in 2001. I like it when Jordan Brand kits out the NCCA teams, and this colourway is just so clean it would look so good on court for so many NCCA teams. One of my favourite memories of the 11 Concords was a young point guard out of Georgetown University, as a silhouette they have some great NCAA roots.
The details are always great on the AJ 11’s, and they are still a statement shoe years later. I will always clock someone wearing the AJ 11’s whether it be on the underground, on the street or on the court!
I always loved that this silhouette made comebacks with different players at different times. Kobe wearing them during his sneaker free agency, Ray Allen, wearing them at Boston and J. R. Smith wearing the cool grey 11 on a massive posterising dunk… And in more recent years Blake Griffin, Lamarcus Aldridge and Jerami Grant have both worn 11’s on court too.
My love for basketball and sneaker culture really sparked interest within my family and influenced my children. We have basketball on in the house at the weekend a lot, and they have actively watched me play at games since they were little. My kids love how much I LOVE IT the most, from an early age I had them in Jordan’s and now they are both teenagers when they look back at photos of themselves as kids, they are surprised at the heat they had on from BC3’s to WC4’s.
There was a period (2016) where the boys’ main shoes were 11’s - Maximo at 8yrs old would wear Legend Blue 11’s and Rubén at 6 would wear 72-10’s, both 11’s but different colourways, and I’d sometimes match with early 2000’s pairs of Breds, Concords or Cool Greys… Now they are older I keep losing pairs to them as they will wear my size! Máximo’s weekends are spent purely in Playoff 12’s, and Rubén has about 8-9 pairs he likes but recently took a shining to my Bred 1’s.
Family is everything, having a strong connection with my kids and doing activities together and spending time are the greatest gifts in life that money can’t buy… we are super lucky to have each other and share interests together.
Our family doesn’t tend to share sneaker traditions but, we do like to do things as a trio. Both my kids have been to various sneaker events since 2013/2014 with me and a couple of other regular attendees, they love the vibe and this I am sure will continue for many more years!
Last month Máximo and I went to LA and San Francisco where we visited several sneaker stores which was great and whenever we are in London we always swing by Offspring and some of the other stores which have collectable Jordan’s that they may never see in the flesh otherwise. They both have their own interests and I’d love for them to enjoy and these things as much as I’ve loved sneakers and basketball all my life.
Check out more from Paul on Instagram @skillz_on_insta
