Early last year, I came across an online listing for a pair of Puma Mikoshi sneakers. Designed by Ray Horacek and inspired by Jikatabi shoes used for traditional Mikoshi festivals across Japan, the Mikoshi has a laceless woven fabric upper and a sole featuring triangular slats that pop out like sharp teeth.
In short, they looked like no other sneaker I’d ever seen.
The discovery sent me trawling online second-hand listings and sneaker-obsessed blogs in the hope of learning more about this abstract sneaker. But, beyond its maker, there was little more to be found online about the Mikoshi. And, thanks to the power of the algorithms, a handful of similar models started to crop up on my screen: Most without laces, many with experimental sole units, and all nigh-on impossible to get concrete information on.
Turns out, this is not uncommon in the wide and wild archive of PUMA.
"It's insane. I've found a few old forums of people chatting about certain pairs but sometimes you'll never find a shoe unless you have an old catalog," says Jesse Oeinck, owner of Vilis Vintage, which specializes in rare sneakers from the '90s and early 2000s. In fact, even within Oeinck's own archive are a few pairs of PUMAs that he hasn't been able to identify.
"If you had the media attention that you have now with a couple of these [sneakers], it would be a lot more viral than it used to be," Tung Hoang, PUMA's Archive Manager, tells me when I ask why I can't find more information online about these left-field PUMA sneakers.
What I did discover was that many of the other PUMA models I'd been seeing came from the brand’s Motion line, an experimental section of the company that allowed its designers to run wild.
"They were starting to transition into an era of experimentation, trying to be as non-traditional as possible. And since the sports lifestyle space was still emerging, you really didn't have any boundaries," says Hoang. "Most of the designers could do whatever they wanted and take influences from wherever they wanted."
With teams based all over the world, new footwear often took inspiration from a designer's home base and surrounding culture. For example, the above-mentioned Mikoshi, the Yutori Fuyu (a slip-on made from shearling fabric that looks like a cross between an UGG boot and Formula 1 race shoes), and the Satori all came from Japan.
The Satori, inspired by Samurai attire, features an upper comprised of strips of layered fabric and comes in a variety of heights — one of which goes all the way up to the knee. Need a pair? You'll have to hunt, but at least one eBay listing has a rare Satori LUX for a cool £7,500 (around $9,542).
Meanwhile, German designer Peter Schmid was up to similarly abstract stuff back in PUMA’s homeland. The Kugelblitz, for example, features a thin silhouette and a large globular heel that’s supposed to be "a big imaginary power source, like a lightning ball, essentially," Hoang tells me.
All released in a period from the late ‘90s up to around 2010, these shoes hit the market at a time when there was no shortage of experimental footwear.
"Designers were really thinking outside of the box [at that time] and it feels like there were no borders," says Oeinck. "Comparing it to right now, a lot of the bigger brands and corporations are kind of playing it safe, instead of taking risks."
The recent success of Oakley Factory Team has shown that there’s a huge archive of unearthed Oakley sneakers of a similar, futuristic ilk, all released around this time. And this is roughly the same the period that Nike ACG launched some of its most experimental outdoor products, from the Aqua Sock sneaker in 2000 to inflatable GORE-TEX jackets in 2008.
When looking at the future-focused designs of a sneaker industry grappling with the beginnings of a new millennium, PUMA is right up there with the most experimental — and people are starting to take notice.
"I started Vilis Vintage almost 4 years ago, so I'm still a rookie, but even 4 years ago there was not much interest in PUMA," says Oeinck. "There are other archivists like Inside Tag that I speak to regularly and they have enjoyed these sneakers for a while. We talk about how it's been years [since we started collecting PUMAs] and now, finally, people are appreciating them."
From specialist sneaker shops to fashion accounts on Instagram, there has been an uptick in people shining a light on PUMA's archive recently. And while the unbelievable work of PUMA’s designers during this time is still confined to niche pockets of the internet, it could be on the verge of a big publicity boost.
If you scroll to the comment section of a post from @obscuresneakers on May 13, you find the New York fashion brand and regular PUMA collaborator KidSuper claiming it will bring back the PUMA Sono. A slip-on shoe that was first teased in 2006, the Sono has a layered upper similar to the Satori, and a slightly more pronounced sole.
However, while there's no evidence yet of KidSuper keeping to its promise, there is one model that's definitely coming back: the PUMA Mostro.
"They wanted to do something completely non-traditional, non-conventional, and revolutionary; they were looking into more extreme sports in that timeframe," says Hoang about the Mostro, which mixes elements from sprinting spike footwear and surfing shoes.
Worn by Madonna throughout her 2002 Drowned World Tour, the Mostro has been popping up on the feet of celebrities once again. A$AP Rocky, PUMA's new F1 creative director, recently stepped out in a pair, and so did Skepta — two musicians known for their impeccable style.
This likely isn't a coincidence. The Mostro was the subject of a collaboration with Ottolinger earlier this year, is returning in two new colorways later this month, and was recently teased for a pink-colored release.
Are we going to see the brand double down on the Mostro in 2024? All the signs are pointing towards it being a big year for the shoe.
With PUMA bringing back one of its most popular shoes from those experimental, early-2000s days, it's fair to hope that this is only the beginning of PUMA's journey through its own vast and boundary-pushing archive.
