Nike Dunk Low Industrial Blue

This is the Dunk that behaves like a basic. Straight leg raw denim, a white oxford shirt and a navy overshirt makes it look considered. For the weekend, grey sweatpants and a faded black hoodie, letting the blue do the only colour work. It also survives an unglamorous commute better than the pale colourways, which is worth something. Sizing runs long and narrow, so half down is the usual call. Clean the midsole sidewall every few weeks, since a yellowing sidewall ages a blue shoe faster than any mark on the upper does. Stuff the toe box when storing.

Nike's beginnings were unglamorous and worth remembering when you look at a plain blue shoe. Blue Ribbon Sports sold about 1,300 pairs in its first year for roughly 8,000 dollars, opened a first store in Santa Monica in 1966 and reached the East Coast at Wellesley, Massachusetts in 1967. Bill Bowerman's frustration with heavy soles led him to pour rubber into his wife's waffle iron, which produced the waffle tread behind the 1972 Moon Shoe and the 1974 Waffle Trainer. A workwear coloured court shoe is closer to that origin than any hyped collaboration.

A Dunk Low in standard configuration, leather over leather, padded collar and tongue, foam sockliner, rubber cupsole with the pivot circle underfoot. Mid tone blues are the most forgiving colour in this model's range: they hide scuffing better than white, do not transfer as aggressively as saturated brights, and photograph consistently in most light. The base panels are where creasing shows and the midsole sidewall is where age shows, so keep both clean and the shoe reads new far longer than a pale colourway would. Underfoot it is flat and firm with minimal cushioning, closer to a court shoe than a trainer, and it stays that way.