The Sports Shoe

The story of the sneaker's rise from the first Victorian tennis shoes to the Nike Air Max and beyond.

Moving from the athletic field to the shopping mall, Thomas Turner tells a fresh story of the evolution of the sports shoe against the changing landscape of society, sport, fashion, industry, and technology. The Sports Shoe takes us on a journey from the first Victorian tennis shoes to the adidas Superstar and the innovative technologies of Nike Air Max. Featuring newly uncovered archival material and historic images showcasing key personalities, vintage marketing and common perceptions of this hugely desirable product, this book is a must-have for any sneaker collector, historian of popular culture, or anyone interested in the place of athletic footwear in our lives today.

“Beautifully chronicling over 100 years of the sports shoe, this is the most intricately detailed love letter to the sneaker ever written.” – Jason Coles, author of 'Golden Kicks: The Shoes that Changed Sport'

“We all wear them. How did the sports shoe become so ubiquitous? Telling the story of its rise and transformation, this is an original contribution to the study of material and popular culture.” – Frank Trentmann, author of 'Empire of Things: How We Became a World of Consumers' and 'Free Trade Nation: Consumption, Civil Society and Commerce in Modern Britain', and Birkbeck, University of London, UK

“A beautifully illustrated and thoroughly researched history ... If you want to know anything about the sport shoe, you must read this book. Just do it!” – Giorgio Riello, author of 'Cotton: The Fabric That Made the Modern World' and 'A Foot in the Past: Consumers, Producers and Footwear in the Long Eighteenth Century', and University of Warwick, UK