Depending on what part of the world you are from, you might of known him as K-Dot back when his Training Day mixtape dropped in 2007. Or a couple years later when he reverted back to his government name and subsequently landed on the cover of XXL’s Freshmen Issue in 2011. Or maybe it was his partnership with Dr. Dre and The Recipe that was your introduction to King Kendrick. But by now, with three studio albums under his belt and on the verge of his third collaboration with Reebok, regardless of where you are from, you and the rest of the world are familiar with Kendrick Lamar.
Back when he was just a young, semi-recognizable extra in Jay Rock’s All My Life video, nobody was thinking that Kendrick Lamar would be selling out sneakers. Especially not with Reebok. On the flip side, Kendrick’s rise to the top of hip hop has not been unexpected to anyone who has worked with him along the way.
Kendrick Lamar in the Reebok Ventilator KL via Reebok
It’s not often you see someone shut down Sunset Boulevard in Hollywood to have a rolling concert, and never has it been done to help launch a sneaker. (See the video and interview from our friend Kustoo, below.)
But despite the audacity, the above release was just the beginning of the Kendrick and Reebok partnership. A campaign for various general release colorways of the Reebok Ventilator followed and then finally, Kendrick’s first true collaboration released in July of 2015. The inspiration for the colorway came from KL’s Compton upbringing, where he saw the struggle of friends and family living in a life of gangs, drugs and violence. Like Kendrick Lamar’s lyrics, the “Red and Blue” Reebok Ventilator aimed to inspire both the crips and bloods to look past the colors and come together for the community. The Ventilators feature Paper White uppers and gum bottoms accented with red on the right shoe and blue on the left, each representing one side of the notoriously rivalrous street gangs.
The same approach was taken on the second Kendrick Lamar x Reebok collab, this time with the iconic Reebok Classic. The Reebok Classic KL used a Steel (grey) upper in place of the off white color of the Ventilator.
The Kendrick Lamar x Reebok Classic “Deconstructed” is the latest collaboration between KL and Reebok. Like the first two releases, the Deconstructed KL Classic takes the same unifying messaging as the Ventilator and Classic Red and Blue. This time with some help from Garbstore’s Ian Paley. But rather than red being on one shoe and blue being on the other like previous Kendrick sneakers, the design is split down the middle by an exaggerated seam, much like the inside out designs Paley first created with Garbstore’s collaborations.
The Kendrick Lamar x Reebok collabs have been some of the most successful releases for Reebok in terms of the secondary market with the price premium of the Classic at 154% and the Ventilator at 99.2%. All in all, the Kendrick Lamar Reebok collaborations are an accurate representation of Kendrick’s music, a simple tried and true approach of statement-making pieces that poignantly differentiate him from fellow rappers like Kanye West and Drake, and their respective adidas Yeezys and OVO Jordans.
