adidas, A Different Story: Liberty x adidas
When you think of Liberty, one of the first things that comes to mind is print. Founded in London in 1875, the brand now has an enormous archive of around 50,000 designs. Its floral prints in particular have become almost a signature over time. Tiny flowers, dense patterns, unexpected colour combinations… Sometimes, even without the Liberty name attached, it isn’t difficult to guess where a fabric came from.
Bringing such a distinctive approach to print to some of adidas’ most classic pieces makes the collection interesting from the start.
Over the past few years, adidas has been talked about not only for its new releases, but also for the return of classics we’ve known for years. Samba is probably the most obvious example. A model that has been around for a long time has made its way back into fashion in recent years, becoming one of the most recognisable shoes in street style.
But classics have one problem: after a while, you start seeing them everywhere.
White Sambas, black Sambas, burgundy Sambas, brown Sambas… The same silhouette keeps appearing. A shoe you desperately wanted at first can start to feel a little too familiar after a while. adidas’ recent collaborations help break that feeling. Instead of changing the shape completely, the brand plays with colour, print and material, making familiar models suddenly feel current again.
The Liberty collection is a particularly good example of this.
Liberty’s romantic, floral and distinctly British aesthetic might not seem like the most obvious match for adidas’ sporty side. In reality, the floral prints work surprisingly well on classic adidas shapes.
And the collection isn’t limited to footwear. Liberty’s floral language also carries over into adidas sportswear. On the shorts in particular, seeing the simple, sporty adidas shapes we’ve known for years covered in florals takes the collection beyond footwear.
The shorts are still adidas shorts. The Samba is still a Samba. They just have a new identity now.
On the footwear, the floral motifs are inspired by traditional Dutch Delft ceramics and were hand-painted in gouache by the Liberty design studio. Adding such a detailed print to a silhouette as familiar as the Samba could easily have felt like too much. But the colours, the three stripes and the shoe’s retro character work remarkably well together.
You can see Liberty, and you can still see adidas. Neither one overshadows the other. For me, that’s one of the things this collection gets right.
So, Is It Worth Buying?
A classic Samba in white leather with black stripes and a gum sole can be worn today and years from now. The same goes for a simple pair of adidas shorts. For some people, the classic will always come first, and there really isn’t much reason to add anything else to it.
But it’s different if you’re tired of seeing the same models over and over again. You’re still buying a model you already love, only this time it feels a little more special and has more character than the version everyone else has. I think that’s where the appeal of owning something more trend-led comes in.
What I like about Liberty x adidas is that it doesn’t try to turn adidas into something else just for the sake of looking new. The pieces we’ve known for years are still there; Liberty simply adds its own language of print.
The florals work especially well on the footwear, paired with current colours and some of adidas’ most popular silhouettes. Carrying that same floral approach into the shorts and other clothing pieces also makes the collaboration feel like more than just a few eye-catching Sambas. The classics may have a longer life in your wardrobe, but the Liberty London collaboration is still very hard to resist.