Nike Cortez "Year of the Tiger"

Nike Cortez “Year of the Tiger”

Posted on 27. Jan, 2010 by bespokeordie in New

Over the last few years Nike via their Nike Sportswear channel has been subtly dropping a new themed holiday release in conjunction with the Chinese New Year. Dubbed the Nike Chinese Zodiac New Year series, things got started back in 2002 with the Air Force 1, celebrating the year of the horse. This year, the “Year of the Tiger,” is no different. Available only to Mainland China, Hong Kong and Taiwan the iconic Nike Cortez was chosen to be the shoe to get dressed up with all the tiger flavor and marks the first running shoe to be a part of the series. For 2010 Nike designers took a new approach to interpreting the tiger. Instead of using the stereotypical yellow and black stripe print, they used white tiger to reflect its image of power and prestige in Chinese traditional culture. Which I am sure put a smile on Siegfried and Roy’s faces. The shoe will be available in two different packages: A traditional Nike shoebox or a unique shoebox design limited to 200 pairs only. The limited shoebox is designed with the same inspiration to complement the shoe: white box with tiger stripe prints and Chinese character “寅” (tiger) on Chinese trigrams and “平安” (peace) are embossed on each side of the shoebox. Finally, the five-finger death grip design is used to open the shoebox in true tiger fashion. Which totally makes sense considering that if you plan on getting your little paws on these you are going to need a five-finger death grip.