What Your Favorite Sneaker Designers Do When They’re Not Designing Sneakers

Salehe Bembury just joined GREATS Brand as the Director of Footwear Design. Before joining GREATS, Salehe was best known for his work on the Lunar Grand, bringing together the worlds of dress shoes and sneakers. His career in sneakers is no accident, as drawing sneakers and shoes have always been an obsession of his. Salehe tells it best: “I have been drawing shoes the majority of my life. When I was a kid, if it was between video games or drawing, I was most likely drawing. The fact that I now get a paycheck to do what I used to do for free, all the time, is surreal to me. So basically, when I’m not designing sneakers professionally, I’m probably still drawing sneakers…and I also go fishing a lot.”

Jon Tang recently joined K-Swiss as the lead designer of Lifestyle Footwear, after five years at PUMA making a name for himself. Jon’s most recognizable work utilizes rich inspirations with clear stories, helping to guide some of the best collaborations of the last half-decade. That success comes from seeing storytelling from a different angle. He explains: “My hobby is to read comics! The visuals and story lines are inspiring. We are in the business of storytelling. Comics are that plus amazing visuals. Some of my favorites are The Dark Knight Returns, Hush, Saga, and Spawn.”

If you follow the Instagram account of Paul Lee, the creative mind behind UBIQ and AtmosNYC’s collaborations, it’s not hard to know what he does when he’s not designing sneakers. You can’t beat being a dad: “Sneakers, sneaker designs, and coming up with different color/design concepts take up a lot of my time, but I enjoy spending time with my wife and daughter. My daughter, Arielle, loves being out and she gets a lot of attention. She absolutely loves people watching, so a lot of our family time is spent at parks, restaurants, malls and so on. Wherever there are a lot of people, we're there. And the great thing about it all is my wife and I get a good workout since we’re busy chasing our daughter around everywhere.”

Since Jake Ferrato, who puts the “JBF” in JBF Customs, has a backlog of four months, and is so overbooked that he rarely opens up commissions to the public, he doesn’t have much time to do anything else. It leaves for limited access to outside stimulus. But he has found time for a few things: “I'd say most time that isn’t spent working on something at least vaguely sneaker related is spent eating. I try to read as much as I can, too. And I just bought a chess set…so I’m trying to become Bobby Fischer in my free time.”

Tinker Hatfield, the man largely responsible for the Golden Age of Nike and Jordan Brand (that we are arguably still experiencing), has always been a perfect fit for the footwear giant. A part of that is due to his extracurricular sensibilities, which are largely athletic, which makes sense. He works for one of the largest athletic companies in the world. Back in 2011, Tinker explained his love for sport, and his continued search for the perfect one: “I'm desperately trying to become a surfer, and I like to cycle and rock climb,” he told Sandpoint Magazine. “My body is so beat up from pole vaulting and football. I need to find sports that aren’t tough on the body.”

Nathan VanHook has been at Nike in one form or another since 2008, designing sneakers and directing other designers. His work has resulted in some of the most coveted (Air Yeezy II), overlooked (LunarTerra Arktos), and divisive (Free Orbit 2) designs in Nike’s recent history. The innovation and inspiration required in taking these design risks comes from a studious mind searching the entire design world. Nathan says: “I keep up to date on what is happening in architecture and industrial design. I’m always reading about new systems, art, fashion, and design.”

After Abraham Hyde emigrated to the U.S. from Russia, he built up enough business as a cobbler to create A.R. Hyde and Sons, manufacturing all sorts of footwear from ice skates to baseball and bowling shoes. When WWII started, A.R. Hyde and Sons stopped all production of consumer wears and exclusively made boots for the U.S. Army. They continued doing so until 1946, long enough to earn the Army-Navy E Award for their productive contribution to the war effort. Then, in the 1960s, they did government work again, creating the moon boots used by the first NASA astronauts. The first space walks were made in Hyde boots. Shortly after their contract with NASA, they acquired a small company by the name of Saucony, whose popularity eventually led to the entire brand being known by that new name.

Of the pair that founded Nike, Bill Bowerman is the lesser known. His business partner, Phil Knight, still helms Nike as the Chairman, and it was Knight’s business acumen that brought Nike to where it is today. But the design advancements that Nike made in running were entirely from Bowerman’s experimentation and curiosity. The same curiosity that eventually stole his mobility after working too closely with toxic chemicals. Before starting Nike with Knight, Bowerman coached track at the University of Oregon (where he coached both Knight and Tinker Hatfield). During his time at UO, he took a trip to New Zealand where he discovered jogging and found its benefits as a fitness routine. He actually brought this new hobby back with him to the U.S., introducing an entire country to a new way of using running to exercise.

Alex Crawford spends his weekdays designing for PONY, who’s in the midst of its historic comeback. Contributing to the upswing of such an iconic brand requires a lot of mental and physical focus. To maintain that concentration, Alex gets his daily escape by running through the streets of New York: “I am fortunate enough to live and work in New York City and during my free time, Friday nights and Sunday afternoons, I spend running. It’s really more of a form of meditation for me. I never go the same route in an attempt to explore every avenue of the greatest city in the world. It’s a time for me to relax, reflect, and soak up my surroundings to return to work refreshed, mentally and physically.”

After this latest World Cup, it shouldn’t surprise anyone that the founder of adidas, Adi Dassler, really loved playing soccer. Back in the 1920s, Adi and his brother Rudolph (who would go off on his own to start PUMA as a result of their vicious sibling rivalry) were working for their father who was a cobbler. Building off of Adi’s love of soccer, the brothers made leather footballs to play around with, and eventually revolutionary athletic shoes. Adi’s work with his father, inspired for his love of sport, would force innovation that found itself on the Olympic stage starting in 1928, all the way through today. If it weren’t for Adi Dassler’s love for soccer, athletic footwear would be in a totally different shape.

Dan Gamache, known to most as simply “Mache” of Mache Custom Kicks, is the most well-known painted sneaker customizer in the industry. That means he’s always working—always sitting at his bench with his airbrush putting together pieces for the likes of LeBron James, Dwyane Wade, or Bacardi. When he has time to himself, he tries to catch a few extra winks, but outside of sleep he stays active playing whatever sports he can: “My little bit of free time I have I’m usually sleeping or watching or playing some sort of sport. I played baseball most of my life and still play softball now that I’m old. I also play basketball, run, and lift, too. That’s pretty much it!”