Italy’s One Block Down has a sublime touch with elegance, as made evident in their individually hand-beaded Vans Slip-Ons from 2022. Their latest project with Japan’s Mizuno proves they can flip the script and get bold and aggressive with their designs.
Utilizing the Wave Rider 10 as the base, One Block Down lights it ablaze and reworks the silhouette from the ground up. Some of the familiar elements remain, such as the speedy RunBird logo on the upper and the exterior heel piece that runs back from the mid-foot, but the entirety of the upper is replaced with a porous, breathable mesh. The fore-foot is particularly exciting as the external toe-box is completely re-shaped to mimic flowing flames.
Three colorways of the “Flame Wave” set the collaboration on fire — Onyx, Amazon, and Koi. Each possess a glossy finish on the color overlay, with matching underlays and accents on the brand logos. One Block Down branding is proudly stamped on the sidewalls and the tongues.
All three pairs of their sizzling collaboration dropped today at One Block Down (and have subsequently sold out), but a global release is scheduled for November 10th across all Mizuno platforms worldwide.