I didn’t get my first pair of Vans until I was thirty-two. So I probably wasn’t the best person for this brief, but if there’s something I do very well, it’s sniffing out inauthenticity.
At the time of this project, Vans was all over the place trying to be all things to all people. What began as a unique identity in the '60s had thinned to the point of being translucent, reflecting whatever was placed over it.
To me, if you work at Vans, you bleed checkerboard. It’s in your veins, in the clots of your scabs, and scribbled in Sharpie along the outsole of your shoes. You’re a band of misfits.
So my pitch? Drop the virtue signaling and own what you know.
