After a very active 2021, KAWS is back with a new collaboration less than one week into the new year. The new partnership comes with The North Face, another brand that’s been releasing new collaborations at a rapid clip. This KAWS x The North Face collection has come on the heels of a huge 25th Anniversary for the artist. Last year, Brian Donnely, celebrated 25 years of art and collectibles under the KAWS moniker with collaborative collections and releases with brands like Supreme, Human Made, sacai, Uniqlo, Nike, and more. For their early 2022 release, KAWS and The North Face have delivered a number of XX adorned outerwear favorites as well as other apparel and accessory pieces. As a whole, the collection featured four different kinds of jackets, but it was the KAWS x The North Face Nuptse Jacket that is the subject of this week’s StockX Pick of the Week.
KAWS and The North Face’s Nuptse Jacket released in three different colors, each of which takes the artist’s graffiti-like painting style and applies it to different sections of the garment. This creates and delivers a visual effect similar to that of the artist’s paintings spread over the jacket’s different panels. The different colorways vary in more than palette, they also use different amounts of color and in different ways. The black colorway and green colorway, for instance, feature five different colored sections of the jacket while the white jacket only has four different colors. All three colors of the jacket align in their branding, which is shown prominently on the front chest and upper back of the jacket in the form of a KAWS XX logo and The North Face logo.
Created with the intention of blurring the lines between performance and new levels of artistry, KAWS and The North Face have maintained the jacket’s technical details. The KAWS x The North Face Nuptse Jacket features the outerwear brand’s popular 700 Fill-down, just like the non-collaborative version plus the classic stowable hood and water-repellent finish. While it hasn’t yet been revealed, it’s expected that these jackets are made from 100% recycled fabrics, considering that’s how The North Face now typically produces their non-collaborative Nuptse Jackets.
The official details of the KAWS x The North Face release have been somewhat opaque and some are unaware of exactly what’s going on. This partnership was first released through an in person pop-up-like mini program on Friday, January 7th, 2022. One week later, the jackets will be made available in Hong Kong at a number of retailers before receiving its official online release. That online release will take place on February 17th, 2021, which is when the KAWS x The North Face collection will be officially available outside of Hong Kong. Though the jackets will not be available via online release until February, StockX has them available right now.
This collaboration kicks off what could be a big year for both brands. It looks like The North Face plans to continue their streak of collaborative partnerships. Last year the outerwear brand delivered two collections with Gucci as well as four with Supreme and one off collections with Palace, Invincible, and Brain Dead. For KAWS, it was unclear whether or not the artist would continue the momentum he built in 2021 into 2022. With 2021 being the artist’s 25th anniversary under that name, it was possible that last year’s unrelenting output would slow down going into 2022. That now seems unlikely as KAWS has taken no rest between the releases of his Nike collaboration and this The North Face partnership.
Stay on the lookout for more collaborative releases from both KAWS and The North Face, as each of these brands are well-positioned to dominate their respective industries this year.
All three KAWS x The North Face Nuptse Jacket colorways are available on StockX below alongside more highlights from the drop.
