HOKA has started 2024 as it finished 2023: immensely.
Honestly, it’s gonna take a brave brand to get in the way of the HOKA train, such is its speed and velocity.
Ever since HOKA broadened its horizons from a performance-only label to a bonafide fashion label sometime in early 2020, it's been virtually unstoppable. Sure, there were collaborations with brands like Engineered Garments in 2018, but it wasn't until two-years later that HOKA really started to gather pace.
Because HOKA isn’t like other footwear brands. It never has been either. When every other label began leaning into the dad shoe trend in the late 2010s, HOKA stuck to designing voluminous running silhouettes, a formula that had seen it garner a more than substantial following since its founding in 2009.
In the proceeding years, HOKA’s chunky boy soles were soon being adopted by more street-savvy fashionistas as well as trail runners. And, like that, HOKA found itself as a style statement, albeit unintentionally.
The momentum HOKA then gathered resulted in a colossal 2023 in which the brand ran amok with a plethora of both mainline and collaborative releases sending the footwear internet into raptures on several occasions.
Well, if we thought that 2023 went well for HOKA, 2024 is shaping up to be even better.
HOKA hit the ground running with its first big release of the year coming back in January when it dropped the sequel to its chunky Tor Summit sneaker, the aptly-titled Tor Summit 2.
The shoe, equipped with an extra chunky midsole and a new rubberised wrap-around, arrived in two muted colorways (black and beige) and sold-out almost instantly shortly after its online release, and then again following a restock.
Soon after that, HOKA re-released its Ora Primo, an extra bulky slip-on mule that actually landed late last year. Again, in a similar vein to the Tor Summit 2, the Ora Primo proved virtually impossible to get a hold of, even with two restocks the following month.
Not one for resting, HOKA switched focus to its performance line with the release of the highly-anticipated Cielo X1, an objectively great-looking carbon-plated running sneaker, which too sold-out.
While the Cielo X1 wasn’t HOKA’s first carbon super shoe, it is the first from the brand to really challenge the likes of Nike, adidas, and New Balance when it came to race-ready silhouettes.
All this without even mentioning HOKA’s Kaha Low, Mafate Three 2, Transport X, Kawana 2, Elite Clifton, and Hopara 2 drops, all of which have been released in the last three months alone.
Interestingly, every one of HOKA’s most hyped releases of the year so far have been mainline releases, all aside from a recent two-piece END. collaboration.
Does this signify a changing of the times that the world of sneakers is no longer as reliant on collaborations? Perhaps.
It does, though, most certainly show that HOKA’s no nonsense, honest approach to footwear continues to be the way forward, both for style-centric wearers and runners.
Truth is, no matter what the rest of the industry is doing and no matter the trends other brands are leaning into, sticking to ideas that got you to where you are in the first place will get you your just rewards. And HOKA’s ongoing success in 2024 is proof.
So, to answer my own question: can anyone stop HOKA? Answer: probably not.
