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Bella HadidCourtesy of adidas
With a little help from Hadid, A$AP Nast and Jules Koundé, the sporting giant has just relaunched this cult 70s silhouette
Last week, professional supermodel Bella Hadid was papped in New York’s West Village at an adidas Originals event. At the promo, Hadid posed on the steps of a flower-covered bus, chatted to a friendly hotdog vendor, and picked up a couple bouquets of her own. While the outfit she wore was off-duty and simple, down below the model sported a pair of adidas SL 72 OGs, which led the internet – and half of fashion’s press – to declare the Samba dead, replaced by Hadid’s own choice of footwear.
But in this industry, nothing happens by chance. It turns out that the model’s NY outing wasn’t just a random day trip after all, but the trial run of a similarly floral SL 72 campaign. The brand new shoot features Hadid clutching some flowers while wearing the classic sneaker silhouette, and also stars rapper A$AP Nast, singer Melissa Bon, footballer Jules Koundé and model Sabrina Lan. The Kenny Germé-lensed images are also accompanied by a short film by Thomas Lachambre that charts the rise of the SL 72.
Though the Samba experienced a meteoric rise to ubiquity over the last couple of years, it obviously wasn’t a new shoe – and the same can be said for the SL 72. Introduced in (you guessed it) the summer of 1972, the big wigs at adidas are probably hoping for a re-run of the Samba explosion, by injecting some hype into an already existing silhouette. Though it may be too early to tell at this point, bagging someone as in demand as Hadid for the relaunch campaign is a step in the right direction.
A$AP NastCourtesy of adidas The relaunch of the SL 72 RS and OG versions also comes during a peak time for sport. With the Paris Olympics happening this summer, most brands are expectedly tapping into the fever, and adidas is of course no different. The whole bouquet theme for the shoot is very Olympics-coded, reminiscent of the flowers and laurel wreaths given to medal winners, and the SL 72 was first introduced as a runners’ shoe for the 1972 summer games in Munich.
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