Exquisite shoes walk the halls of Roosevelt

Constance Johnson and Jeffrey McLain, Staff Writers

At Roosevelt shoes are a grandiose thing. Everyone has good pairs of shoes, but some stand out. Some are crazy expensive, rare and hard to find.  

You cannot walk the hallways of Roosevelt without seeing about 10 pairs of Yeezy’s, Retro Jordans, Balenciaga, Dolce & Gabbana and just so much more. Roosevelt is full of surprises when it comes to outfits and shoes. 

Senior Antonio Wilkins has a wide variety of shoes with all different styles and prices. His most expensive? “Probably my Gucci shoes or my Amiri’s they worth around $800-900,” Wilkins said. 

But style for Wilkins isn’t really about money. “When you have different varieties and flavors, don’t matter the price, long as you can dress,” Wilkins said. 

Shoes are a form of expression. In most outfits, the shoes are the most important and the highlight of the outfit. You can have a good top and bottom but if your shoes do not pull the outfit together, then is the outfit even viable anymore?   

Sophomore Jawaun Carter has a big selection of different kinds of shoes and the way he styles them matters. “Sometimes it will be matching my shirt – or not matching. It should be standing out by itself,” Carter said. “So if I had red shoes specifically, I would make sure it’s red by itself, then the rest of the outfit would be black. 

To Carter his shoes are a big part of the way he expresses himself and has had shoe game since he was born! 

“From when I was born my father always made sure I had a lot of good shoes,” Carter said. “He liked all the new shoes and he made sure I had them.”  

 When asked what his shoes mean to him, he responded with “Mean a lot, like I think they are the biggest part of the outfit. They stand out – especially because my feet big.” 

 Shoes have meaning to them, and to have meaning you have to start somewhere.  There must be a backstory or a place where sneaker hype originated. There must be a reason people sit in line for hours and hours for new sneaker releases.  

“I don’t stand in line, I go to Stock X or GOAT if I don’t get the raffle, which most times I don’t. Like for Yeezy’s mostly, I just go to Stock X and I pay the resale value, which is typically about $100 more, but I’m not waiting in line,” said Assistant Principal Cory Carter, who has been collecting sneakers since he was about 16 and estimates he now has between 80 – 100 pairs. 

AP Carter is selective about when he buys shoes; he is not just blowing off his money impulsively. “I know that I like nice sneakers, so I don’t just go out and buy them. Like, ‘Oh I’m in a store, let me just buy these.’ No, I know I want these sneakers, so let me save $500 here and $500 there, and then now I got enough to get them,” Carter explained. 

In 1986, Run-DMC (a hip hop group) came out with the song “My Adidas” which then led to a sponsorship deal with the brand which kicked off the sneaker phenomenon. 

 Even before that, basketball style & youth culture came together to form the foundations of what is now sneaker culture. Now sneaker collections are not uncommon, and AP Carter has a kind of philosophy about what makes a true collection. 

  “Variety. Having different brands, different styles, low top, high top, suede. That to me is a true sneaker collection. If you look at my sneaker collection you probably couldn’t tell which one I like more because I have pretty much all brands,” AP Carter said. “That is like a true sneaker collection to me, when you have a variety.” 

A common way to keep shoes clean and new looking is to keep them in the boxes they came in. In Jawuan Carter’s shoe collection ever, shoe has its place. picture by Jawuan.
Throughout Roosevelt you see many people with yeezy’s on. Jawaun Carter had on one of his many pairs of Yeezy’s that stand out from the rest of the styles you would usually see.
Burberry Animal Print is one of Antonio Wilkins’ unbelievably expensive shoes that he owns. Wilkins often gives his shoes away. “I’ve been giving out shoes when I could to people who can’t [buy them]” Wilkins said.
Alexander McQueen actually makes boots as seen here, “They look a little bit like Nike boots but when they look closely, they like oh, those are McQueen’s.” AP Carter said when explaining how his shoes looked.

 

Versace Chain Reactions are shoes that you do not see often. AP Carter loves to sport shoes that no one really has. “They were 1200 and I just bought them recently.” Carter said when expressing how much one of his expensive shoes costs.