Shoe collabs: Dr Martens links with Alpha Industries and Clarks with Popcaan
Fashion collaborations are coming thick and fast in the run-up to Christmas. On the footwear front, the latest are from serial shoe collaborators Dr Martens and Clarks
First Dr Martens. With both brands hailing from the 60s and sharing foundations in workwear, Dr Martens and Alpha Industries have formed an ideal heritage-based product partnership.
Alpha is known for its US Air Force MA-1 flight jacket, still manufactured to its original military specifications and defined by its bright reversible lining and utility pockets.
So the collaboration has seen Dr Martins remastering its Tarik and 1460 Ben boots in Smooth leather and Nylon with added sleeve pockets on the ankle and a removable Alpha Industries pull tab, a feature taken directly from the MA-1, alongside black laces and the footwear brand’s recognisable yellow stitching.
Also, “DM’s attitude” is given a utility edge with the Alpha Backpack. Featuring added pockets, it comes in a hardwearing mix of Smooth leather, Kiev leather and Nylon and includes the same Alpha Industries pull tab.
The collaboration is brought to life through a campaign video with Lloyd Clipston, the drummer of eclectic London alternative band Powerplant, “known for their distinctive, genre-defining sound”.
Over at Clarks, the footwear retailer’s Originals brand has joined forces with musician Popcaan to bring a new Wallabee silhouette to the market this month.
We’re told Popcaan’s ties to Clarks Originals are deep, with the Jamaican musician starring alongside Vybz Kartel, in the dancehall classic ‘Clarks’, with its opening lyrics ‘A wey yuh get tha new Clarks deh, dawdi?’
For his very first collaboration with Clarks Originals, Popcaan lends the Wallabee Boot an “off-beat look and feel… it’s an icon remade for today’s generation”.
His bold aesthetic is bought to life via the striking camo print. And reveals his signature ‘Unruly’ wording interspersed throughout the pattern and insole. The co-branded fobs – one in red, one in black – tie everything together on a statement note, while crafted stitching and the signature crepe soles are Clarks’ own branding.
The collaborative capsule will be released on 10 November, available to buy online on Clarks’ websites in the UK, EU, US, Japan, China as well as in store in London (Berwick Street), Manchester, Osaka, Tokyo, and Beijing, priced £150/€180/$190.
