So many shoes but only two feet
I speak to footwear designer Richard Kuchinsky about the confluence of running shoe design and run culture and it's all about Nike
Shoes. They’re the only essential part of every runner’s wardrobe.
They’ve also always been equally crucial in reflecting and dictating the tempo of running culture. From the waffle sole that spearheaded the 1970s running boom, through the cushion and support of the ‘80s and ‘90s, and the minimalism of the new century, whatever the prevailing running shoe technology is, we buy the options available to us.
Since 2018, it’s the super shoe movement with its carbon plates and high-tech foams that has really changed how we interact with running. For instance, the Boston qualification time dropped a few minutes yet again this week, to be almost 14 minutes faster than 2015.
When Nike told us that the Vaporfly would give fast runners 4% better running economy, it made people believe in themselves. It made people try harder knowing that their goals were 4% more achievable.
“Cultures are so often based around gear,” explains Richard Kuchinsky, a freelance running shoe designer from Toronto. “Super shoes had that effect where – all of a sudden – there was something to have as a talisman. It was one of those times where my parents would see an article in a normal mainstream publication that had something about shoes, and they’d send it to me.”
“It broke through that barrier into the mainstream. Nike started making all these urban run crews before that, but it definitely never got to the mainstream like super shoes did.”
I met Richard last year and it was immediately clear we could talk running at each other for a while. He’s currently working on several shoes that will be released over the next 18 months. There are hundreds rather than thousands of athletic shoe designers around the world, but Richard tells me he looks for projects where he can do something different. He’s the kind of guy who has an eye for a classic car, and installs smoked glass and unlacquered brass in his mid-century home. Yes, I want to visit.
I spoke to Richard not long after the Craft Kype Pro was released – a shoe notable for the split heel that’s designed to add stability when traversing a marathon course at speed. You need that going around corners, for instance. The shoe has a distinct philosophy and purpose, and Richard was able to add the insight of needing an extra touch of stability on these high-stack super shoes because he runs marathons himself. It’s not a given.
Richard only started running a decade ago when he was working with a running brand designing zero drop shoe and saw first-hand how passionate runners were.
“It was one of those classic things where I couldn’t run a kilometer, joined a run club, and they said I should sign up for a race.”
He was initially shocked that a 10k race could cost so much and start so early, but, despite having never even run a 5k at that point, signed up. Richard approached the running world with his designer’s eye for style, picking up on underlying trends as he came across them. On his way to becoming a four-time Boston qualifier, he noticed how the prevailing image of run culture seemed forced.
“I remember seeing an article about how starting this run club in New York was an underground grassroots thing by some agency for Nike, and I remember thinking that made so much sense because when I first started going to run clubs, that was exactly the vibe. Everyone had the latest Nike stuff, the Nike van turned up, but it wasn’t overtly a Nike run club. The cool guys leading it showed us a promo of The Speed Project. It was such a Nike ad without being a Nike ad.”
“When all the road clubs got together for Bridge The Gap, they all had similar logos and everyone was mostly wearing Nike, and it was no coincidence that was the time when Nike started coming back into running.”
It’s all about selling more shoes, after all. Nike pushed urban run crew culture to recruit new runners by making running something cool to attach your personality to. It was the other end of the spectrum to performance. Both strategies are effective.
Cut to 2025 and sentiments about brand involvement in running culture don’t just still exist, but often seem like they’re coming to a head. In recent weeks, Saucony came under severe criticism from communities in London that they’ve embedded themselves in for sponsoring the Jerusalem Marathon that travels through Palestine, glorifying occupation and using IDF soldiers as brand ambassadors. All to sell more shoes. Rotten stuff.
“More money, more brands, more participants is always better, but I think it starts to become tricky when the snake starts to eat its own tail. When brands start to get involved with community stuff, whether it be clubs or events. It’s not sustainable.”
Even more than that, I would suggest it’s disingenuous, if not impossible. Can a brand really take a moral stance? Unless it’s written into code, the ethics of a brand’s actions are in place for as long as the employee is in place. How can that ever truly dovetail with a grassroots community’s standards? How can the cultures co-exist?
At a lower level is the common occurrence of launching products using run crews as cheap models in the same blurry nighttime photos that are difficult to distinguish from every other brand’s campaigns. Richard cites an irritation with the image of the all-black-clad young runner we see in every other slick marketing campaign these days. He comes at me with a stat that only 38% of Boston participants are between 18-39 years old. That’s the demographic range these brands are aiming at. What about everyone else?
“It’s the disconnect from reality to what’s portrayed in marketing that is the actual problem. What do ‘real’ runners look like? The ones who are actually running.”
I suggest you run a local 5k and you’ll soon find out. Back to a few questions about shoes to finish off.
Are super shoes still a niche item, reserved for elite runners?
“I would counter that. It’s well past being only for elite runners. I wrote an article that super shoes are dead because everyone has super shoes. You’re just as likely to see people in the back of the pack running a five-hour marathon or jogging a 5k wearing super shoes than just the elites.”
Are we on the way to a $1000 shoe?
“At this point it doesn’t really matter. When the Adidas Adios Pro One came out and that was $500, people were like, ‘Oh my!’ But enough people bought it, and now basically nobody cares. People buy them to wear for a 5k.”
Do running shoes really only last 300 miles or are the shoe companies pulling a fast one?
“I think the numbers are real. I don’t think it’s a big scam to get people to buy new shoes. It’s a limit of the physical materials, because especially with foams, the compression set will wear out, they won’t be bouncy, and they won’t do their job. Why can’t somebody make a pair of shoes that lasts 1000km? The problem is that nobody wants to pay for that. You can make a shoe that lasts 1000km, but maybe the foam is super heavy and hard. Or nobody wants to pay $600 for a pair of shoes that doesn’t wear out. There’s always compromise.”
Find out more about Richard Kuchinsky via his agency, The Directive Collective.
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Thanks for reading,
Raz x
What’s fascinating about Nike starting all these running crews is that when they disinvested, the whole movement really took off and laid the seeds for their current woes! A fascinating little case study of how “community” (in quotes when it’s founded by a brand) can take on a life of its own.
Maybe I’m cynical but I’m not sure the cultures can co-exist. As soon as brands get involved, communities become commodities, and runners become “economic units” as Logan Roy would say.