Brighter days are ahead. Well, for the Nike Air Max Sunder, at least.
A retro sneaker through and through, the Nike Air Max Sunder first hit the scene in the late ’90s and has bobbed in and out of obscurity in the 25 years since, only heightening its allure. I mean, don’t we all want what we can’t have? (No? Just me?)
Unfortunately for the better part of two decades, the Nike Air Max Sunder has been relatively absent from the sneaker scene after what was already a short-lived stint on the shelves.
That is until a July drop of Nike’s Air Max Sunder in “Canyon Gold” (an OG colorway) restored hope that the zipped-up and dripped-out sneaker would get a chance to stay a while. It was retro, it was futuristic, and then it was gone, aside from a few hard-to-get collaborations and hopeful whispers of another release.
To be fair, those collabs were the initial revival of the Nike Air Max Sunder, including COMME des GARÇONS’ Air Max Sunder SP, which first debuted in 2021, and Kids Of Immigrants’ retool of the zip-up sneaker that was teased on Instagram this year.
Well, the Air Max Sunder revival has started up again, this time featuring some new, brighter colorways set to be released throughout the rest of the year.
One of the most striking pairs boasts a black and neon-pink upper contrasted with a buoyant white midsole, one of the brightest colorways the Sunder has ever sported.
The other forthcoming colorways are more neutral in hue but no less spicy, including a monochromatic black GORE-TEX moment lowkey reminiscent of the blacked-out Nike NOCTA Hotstep.
The classic roots of the shoe are otherwise untouched as the unconventional zipped upper and signature Air Max cushioning remain, leaving in place one of Nike’s great underappreciated (Sunderappreciated?) running shoes.