New Balance 9060 Dark Royal Brown

Part of New Balance's 9060 line. This release has a mesh upper. Dark Royal with brown is an unusual pairing, cool and warm forced together, and the 9060 is the right shoe for that kind of argument. The model exists to distort the 99x running family into something sculpted and contemporary, so a colourway that refuses to be tidy suits its purpose. Where the pale and tonal versions of this shoe try to soften its strangeness, this one accepts it. New Balance has been privately held under Jim Davis since 1972, which has let it design without quarterly pressure to please everyone, and shoes like this are what that independence buys: a silhouette and a palette that both take a position.