Kanye West was a recent guest on Nick Cannon‘s “Cannon’s Class” and the rapper-turned-designer had plenty to say about footwear.
Early in the interview, West told Cannon that when he was learning to design shoes that he wanted to replace the extremely popular Nike Roshe. The result was the Adidas Yeezy Boost 350.
“When me and Virgil used to go and intern with Giuseppe Zanotti, and he was teaching us how to design shoes and everything, we would be in the airport and we saw this shoe by Nike called the Roshe. It was the No. 2 selling shoe that Nike had — No. 1 is the Monarch, which is the main dad shoe,” West said. “This is before dad shoes became cool. I looked at that Roshe and I said, ‘I need to replace that shoe,’ and now when you go to the airport you definitely see 350s and you don’t really see the Roshe anymore.”
West, a Chicago native, also expressed his desire to wear the signature shoes of an athlete synonymous with his city: Michael Jordan.
“In my Adidas contract, I definitely should be able to wear Jordans. Jordans need to be part of reparations. You can’t tell a Black man not to wear Jordans,” West said with a laugh. “Any deal [should say], ‘But you could wear Jordans.'”
He also addressed how non-competes in contracts changed when he began designing for both Nike and luxury label Louis Vuitton.
“God had a plan. There was no non-compete. High fashion was never in a competition with sportswear so when my first shoes came, God had the Nike Yeezys and the Louis Vuittons,” West said. “I had a lot of Louis’ and that’s when they were like upset, they were like ‘Ah man, we didn’t think of that, we had no idea you were going to have a Nike come out at the same time that your Louis Vuitton sneaker came out,’ so then they started putting in these non-competes and the funny thing is I was talking to a gentleman that works at an ad agency and he said that right when I went to the Gap, ‘we don’t say The Gap, it’s Gap with no the.’ Right when I went to Gap, Gap got put on the non-compete for everything.”
Watch the full West interview with Cannon below.
And if you don’t own the aforementioned Adidas Yeezy Boost 350 but are interested in picking up a pair, several are available via resale now. Among the looks on the secondary market are the popular Adidas Yeezy Boost 350 “Turtle Dove” and “Pirate Black” looks, which have low asking prices of $1,610 and $899, respectively, on StockX now.
To Buy: Adidas Yeezy Boost 350 “Turtle Dove,” $1,610 and up; StockX.com
To Buy: Adidas Yeezy Boost 350 “Pirate Black” (2016), $899 and up; StockX.com
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