Oxygen and light applied onto liquid polymer. That’s the formula Adidas is using to manufacture their latest generation of footwear, the ALPHAEDGE 4D. Digital Light Synthesis was developed with Carbon to allow the footwear makers to tailor midsole structure for cushioning, stability, and comfort specific to the weight and activity of its wearer. Now Amsterdam’s Studio Hagel is using the 3D-printed midsoles and compositing a hybrid shoe as componetry to reconstruct their own unique hi-top reinterpretation.
From Andy Barr, Adidas’s global category director for running:
With AlphaEdge 4D our goal is to enhance the athlete’s preparation for their sport. Running is the foundation of every athlete’s training and at adidas we understand that each athlete exhibits different movement patterns based on their sport, stature and gender.
The original goals of the ALPHAEDGE 4D as stated above – available domestically in the US since February – may have been motivated in servitude of the needs of athletes, but the company of one known as Studio Hagel envisioned something wholly different – a design completely driven by creative inspiration.
Using a pair of Daniel Arsham x Adidas Futurecraft 4D sneakers, footwear designer Mathieu Hagelaar partially disassembled the original Primeknit toebox from the intricate lattice of its 3D-printed midsoles to incorporate them with the high-collared sockliner from the Adidas EQT hoops height hi-top. The results are Frankenstein sneakers with an entirely new silhouette, imaginably suitable for an early 1990s space station dance party.
Check out more of Mathieu Hagelaar’s unique sneaker remixes over at the Studio Hagel Instagram feed.