A look at a legendary shoe, the Nike Air Force 1 'West Indies', as told by Aman Tak.

Lets set the scene… The early 2000s were an interesting time for the Air Force 1. It was still as robust as ever, being built with super premium leathers that were hard wearing for the London’s urban terrain and maintaining that tapered shape from its incubation in the 80s.

There was a real buzz around the silhouette globally, as well as around our city. We were seeing regional colours coming out from France, Italy, US and Japan with everyone scrambling to try and get colours that others could not.

The chase was real. There were a lot of calls being made and favors being pulled to try and get our hands on whatever we could.

The internet was in its infancy and the only means of access was either going to the country, asking a friend, trusting someone you’ve met on a sneaker forum to do a transaction, or hitting up your favourite grey market sneaker shop where you might have to pay double retail price.

The recently retro’d A-Corn was released in the US, France had the euro pack which was made up of super premium tumbled leathers in brown/cream and Black white gum and Japan were teaming up with stores to bring out crazy iterations in a multitude of colours and materials.

On top of this inline hysteria, Nike was planning a multitude of special edition packs in the background. We were about to see them up the levels and create some shoes that would turn out to be future grails. We were blessed with a HTM release consisting of 2 incredibly premium executions in Black and Brown, Stash AF1 high which came out in LDN, NYC and TKO, Year of the Horse AF1 Low, Rasheed Wallace AF1 Hi, Mita AF1 low… the list was endless.

Amongst all this they sneaked in one that would send sneaker heads crazy and make the Sneaker Hall of Fame.

In 2002 Nike released a very clean AF1, with a green sole, green lining, and a little logo inscribed on the heel and tongue. This logo had the words ‘West Indies’ with a little palm tree on it and only available in the States. From this moment, the search was on. From what was initially created to celebrate NYC’s West Indian Day Parade Carnival, I wonder whether Nike knew the shoe would live beyond its cultural relevance and retain cult-like status. The shoe went on to be seen on various celebrities and was infamously featured in the Nelly and Kelly Rowland track 'Dilemma' (not to say this added to its popularity) which showed the scope its popularity reached. We had stores here selling it on the grey market for double its price and selling out to the pair.

Nike would go on to capitalise on its success by releasing another iteration in 2003. Same build, same quality, but with a colour flip. The green accent was removed and exchanged for the yellow and the logo placement remained on the heel and tongue. 2004 another white red option appeared and then we had a break in 2005.

Fast forward to now. 20 years on we see Nike bring back the cult classic intime for this anniversary edition. All details and quality remain, From the tumbled leather to the logo on the heel and even the insole prints gets the OG nod. Only change we see is the ‘Anniversary’ call out on the tongue to signify and differentiate from the original.

The Nike air force 1 ‘West Indies’ Anniversary will be launching 26th Aug in all stores and online