Nike Spikes Handmade By Co-Founder With Early Logos Estimated To Sell For $1.2M
Image via Sotheby’s
These Nike sneakers don’t have that perfect ‘swoosh’ logo, but they’re not knockoffs either. And they’re worth about a million dollars.
With Olympic fever on a high, auction house Sotheby’s is celebrating the games with a special Olympic Collection sale, set to open on July 23—the same day as the Tokyo 2020 Olympics’ Opening Ceremony. Among the prized items to look out for is a scruffy pair of track and field spikes handmade by Nike co-founder Bill Bowerman.
The rare footwear, designed by Bowerman in the 60s and altered in the 70s, is notably emblazoned with four “prototype logos” at its sides. They’re not quite the multimillion-dollar checkmark you know and love, and appears more like arrows.
The symbols “show Bowerman experimenting with the concept of a brand, and happen to bear a remarkable resemblance to the now famous Nike Swoosh,” Sotheby’s describes.
The shoes were intended for Canadian track and field sprinter and Olympian, Harry Jerome, and feature the first-of-their-kind Waffle soles.
Bowerman, then a track-and-field coach at the University of Oregon, had stressed over watching his athletes’ metal cleats get damaged at the school’s brand-new track. Years later, he found his solution to a shoe that could gain traction even in bad weather… while having waffles for breakfast with his wife.
The spikes are anticipated to sell for US$800,000 to US$1.2 million, an estimation expectedly motivated by their extreme rarity. “Very few pairs are known to exist, one of which is held at the Special Collections and University Archives of the Knight Library at the University of Oregon,” Sotheby’s explains.
[via CNN, images via Sotheby’s]
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