On Mark Parker’s role in the development of the Nike MAG 2011:
One of the really fun tasks was to make the Nike MAG 2011 look like the original pair seen in the movie. We really spent a lot of time with Mark Parker on this matter; he has such a great eye. He’s been a big part of our creative team, not only supporting us but also actually getting in and having creative ideas. We talked a lot about if we’re going to recreate the shoe, there needed to be certain coherence to them, especially for collectors. So, we really went into great detail with this shoe. Mark has always been a creative force in his own right. We were side by side in working on this.
On the athletic attributes incorporated into the Nike MAG 2011’s design:
The whole notion of the predated sidewall is a little bit behind where the flex zone has to be. If the big sidewall went all the way up, it would have great lateral stability, but it would be stiff as a brick. So, this sidewall design sort of got picked up by a lot of basketball designs. One of the things that is really unique about this shoe is what I would call a floating external heel counter. It’s really a separate piece that holds your heel in place. It gives you a more natural feeling. People just started doing that in basketball design. We are also now figuring out how to design a good portion without the labor of stitching; this shoe actually predates a lot of the new models we have. All basketball shoes prior to this were much thicker, and now you see basketball shoes much lower thanks to this shoe’s low profile. Most basketball shoes had a lot of extra layers of stuff in the toe area. Now you see all kinds of basketball shoes with what we call a clean toe. In fact, Michael Jordan insists on it. He doesn’t like any basketball shoe that doesn’t have a clean toe. He may not even know where he got the simplistic, clean look, but it possibly was this.
“Most basketball shoes had a lot of extra layers of stuff in the toe area. Now you see all kinds of basketball shoes with what we call a clean toe. In fact, Michael Jordan insists on it. He doesn’t like any basketball shoe that doesn’t have a clean toe. He may not even know where he got the simplistic, clean look, but it possibly was this.”– Tinker Hatfield |
On the absence of power laces within the Nike MAG 2011’s design:
Well, we can’t talk about it too much because it’s really proprietary intellectual property. Our standard line is that this shoe had power laces in the year 2015. We’re working on it. Let’s just say that. This shoe has been one of the most difficult shoes I’ve ever been involved with; just this one, without the power laces. So, it was very difficult to get it ready in this amount of time. Time is wasting for people who have Parkinson’s disease and for people who need help. So, we wanted to do this now and see what the future brings. No pun intended.
On the involvement of the Michael J. Fox Foundation:
We decided this about five years ago when we talked about what it would take to do this shoe. We also stated that if we ever got to the point where we could sell it, the profits should go to the Michael J. Fox Foundation. So, way before we knew we could do it, we talked about that. We just felt like that would be a real awesome thing to do as a human being or corporation. That was the driving force behind all of this. Our goal is to raise as much money for the Michael J. Fox Foundation as possible. We have some matching grants out there from some generous people. So, the more money we make, that gets double. Our goal is to just do the best we can with that.
