Sports brand Adidas has commissioned Dutch designer Simone Post to make rugs from worn sport shoes.

Worn sport shoes exist in large quantities in the world, and it has a steady waste flow, so it is interesting to see if they can be recycled. The rugs were commissioned to give old and dirty shoes a new and useful second life.

The German based company I:CO collects clothes and shoes worldwide, including sport shoes. Unwearable shoes are recycled into little rubber pallets. These pallets were used by Post to make the Adidas rugs.

Aside from pliability and strength, Post also had to consider the aesthetics of the rug. Per Post’s request, I:CO divided the rubber pallets in black and white hues. Post used the different colours to create a rug with black and white stripes, a reinterpretation of Adidas’ distinctive stripes.

From a distance, the stripes appear to be just black and white, but when viewed from up close, the original colour varieties of the former sport shoes become apparent.

The so-called Stripped Down Stripes rugs were a test case for the recycled shoes pallets, as well as an exploration on different ways to process the material. The rugs are exhibited in the Adidas store Paris Champs-Élysées.

Simone Post is well-known for her use of waste Vlisco fabrics to make rugs. You can see these rugs in real life at our trade fair MaterialDistrict Rotterdam, 12-14 March in Rotterdam Ahoy, the Netherlands! Click here for a free ticket.

Photos: Ronald Smits