Air Footscape

Client: Nike

Footscape Interview

1995

  • Needfinding
  • Industrial Design

Air Morphous

The Footscape was designed around an anatomically correct foot form, not the normal Last. A Last  is the form shoes are built on and they are part anatomy and part art. This project was initiated by FUSE principal, Toren Orzeck, while in Nike’s Advance Product Engineering group. Birkenstocks were coming back into the mainstream so building an anatomical correct foot form seemed like a good idea.

A neutral runner with laces running down the lateral side of the shoe.  The design of the upper enhances comfort by moving the laces away from the superficial tendons and arteries that run on the peak of the dorsal side of the foot. Instead the Footscape puts them on the lateral side. This eliminates the point loads caused by the laces. Not only is the shoe more comfortable, but it is also is visually different telling  the running consumer there is something going on.

This shoe has gained “classic” status and is still made in a variety of materials and colorways in Nike’s Sportswear line.  Alot has been written about the Footscape and here’s one article:

https://www.sneakerfreaker.com/features/all-time-greatest/all-time-greatest-nike-air-footscapes/

 

Big thanks  to  Sneaker Freaker for some of the images in this post.

Final Design

This was the design that I settled on . The simple design was very much inspired by the simplicity of Nike's Waffle Trainer and Nike Elite but with this ergonomic twist of the lateral lacing. I made T shirts to help sell it internally and this is an image of exactly that. My name,"Air Morphous" did not make the cut.

Prototypes

One of my first prototypes features an embossed foot glyph embossed onto the reflector on the heel strap and the cartoonish AIR logo type on the back of the midsole. I did not get the glyph, but initial production did get the funner AIR identity.