Once upon a time, before the pandemic, trainers were big and chunky. Everyone seemed to gravitate towards bubbly soles and a grey colour palette, like something an American dad might wear in belted chinos while mowing the lawn. And then, of course, came the Great Slim-ification of trainers, resulting in the retro silhouette that dominates today (I have a theory that the Balenciaga 10XL effectively killed off the dad trainer; we dad trainered too close to the sun).
But one trainer brand does seem to have bucked the above trend recently, and that’s Asics – beloved by everyone from Timothée Chalamet to Kendrick Lamar and now, apparently, model Kendall Jenner, who was recently pictured in a pair of silver Asics while leaving a Pilates class in LA. While she didn’t opt for the extra futuristic iteration we’re seeing a lot of – the Asics GEL-Kinetic Fluent or the Asics GEL-Quantum Kinetic – but rather a relatively low-key take, the model is still doing her bit to keep the dad trainer trend alive well into the latter half of the 2020s.
She’s not the only one. “This season, we’re seeing a distinct shift toward tech-infused silhouettes, characterised by sleek, dynamic uppers and innovative sole structures,” Anissa Jaffrey, PR and collaborations lead at Asics SportStyle Europe, told British Vogue earlier this year (although, she would say that). Either way, maybe it’s time to embrace a bit of bounce when it comes to our trainers.
This isn’t the first time Jenner has backed the beloved normcore style. The model has been known to dabble in a techy Nike trainer, or a classic chunky New Balance (she’s an OG clean girl, after all). Does it make me want to throw on a pair of leggings, yank my socks up to mid-calf, pop on a pair of silvery dad sneakers and “do a class”? Kind of. Maybe without the Pilates part.
