Breathe in Color: Clot and adidas Reimagine the Superstar in Pink Transparency
May 18, 2025
There’s a certain kind of reverence reserved for the adidas Superstar. Born in 1969 as a low-top basketball shoe and immortalized by hip-hop royalty in the 1980s, the shell-toe has seen more cultural intersections than most sneakersdream of. And yet, in 2025, the silhouette finds itself newly reawakened—not through archival nostalgia or classic colorways, but through a bold collab with CLOT that dares to breathe life, and light, into its structure.
Enter the Clot x adidas Superstar “Breathe Pink”, a shoe that feels more like a study in air than a product of rubber and leather. The latest installment in Clot’s ongoing dialogue with adidas Originals, “Breathe Pink” strips down the Superstar to its most elemental form—quite literally removing the lining to allow transparency, softness, and symbolism to take center stage. It’s a sneaker designed not just to be worn, but to be seen through.
This isn’t the first time Clot, the brainchild of Edison Chen and Kevin Poon, has played with translucency. The brand’s collaborations with Nike—the famed “Kiss of Death” Air Max 1 being the most iconic—built a language around semi-exposed construction, materials that revealed rather than concealed. But with adidas, and especially with the Superstar, there’s something deeper happening. The “Breathe Pink” edition takes one of the most solid, iconic sneaker profiles in the game and makes it fragile. Vulnerable. Almost poetic.
The sneaker’s base is a semi-transparent mesh, delicately tinted in soft pink. The toe cap—traditionally a hard rubber shell in classic Superstars—is rendered in frosted TPU, maintaining the silhouette’s signature form while allowing light to pass through it like a paper lantern. The Three Stripes on the sidewall are stitched in tonal pink thread, subtle enough to be almost spectral. Laces are flat and pale, while the heel tab bears the Clot logo alongside adidas Originals’ trefoil—a quiet fusion of East and West that nods to Clot’s DNA.
What distinguishes the “Breathe Pink” release, however, is not just the design choices, but the emotional vocabulary embedded in it. Clot has long espoused the philosophy of “bridge-building”—connecting cultures, ideas, and generations. Here, the transparency serves as a metaphor. The shoe breathes. It reveals. It welcomes interpretation. For some, the soft pink hue evokes calm and clarity; for others, it’s a symbol of vulnerability, of being open to the world’s gaze. The sneaker doesn’t just walk—it whispers.
The construction also reimagines comfort. The interior is stripped of padding, allowing the foot to engage more directly with the structure of the shoe. There’s a barefoot intimacy to it, yet the rubber outsole and torsion stability bar ensure that the performance framework remains intact. It’s as if Clot has created a shoe that feels like a second skin—protective, but permissive.
Visually, “Breathe Pink” exists at the intersection of streetwear and serenity. In a market dominated by heavy leathers, hyper-styling, and maximalist palettes, its whisper-pink minimalism offers respite. You don’t wear this shoe to dominate the room—you wear it to exist within it, comfortably, thoughtfully. The transparency also invites personalization. Depending on the sock (or lack thereof), the shoe subtly morphs in color and contrast, becoming a kind of wearable mood ring.
Adidas, for its part, continues to prove that the Superstar is not a static icon, but a living one. The willingness to hand over the keys to a collaborator like Clot—to literally strip away decades of visual weight—is a bold move that underscores the brand’s interest in evolution rather than repetition. The “Breathe Pink” Superstar is not about rehashing the past. It’s about airing it out, letting it move, letting it breathe.
From a fashion perspective, the shoe slots neatly into today’s taste for modularity and quiet design. The translucent trend, once considered a niche in the world of tech runners and avant-garde silhouettes, is now part of a broader aesthetic shift. We are moving away from aggressive maximalism toward pieces that adapt, that soften, that respond to the wearer. The “Breathe Pink” Superstar isn’t about ego. It’s about energy.
Styling the shoe is equally liberating. It pairs effortlessly with everything from oversized trousers and silk shirts to structured tailoring and streetwear staples. Its softness acts as an anchor, grounding louder pieces while elevating more minimal looks. And for those who treat shoes as part of an expressive wardrobe, the shoe’s transparency becomes a canvas—revealing the sock underneath, the skin tone within, the stride you walk with.
As with most of Clot’s limited releases, the “Breathe Pink” drop comes with intentional scarcity. It’s not a mass-market sneaker—it’s a statement. And that’s by design. Clot’s approach to collaboration is less about trend-hopping and more about storytelling. Each release is a narrative thread, tied to philosophy, heritage, and feeling. “Breathe Pink” may be minimalist in palette, but it is maximal in intent.
Perhaps the ultimate beauty of the Clot x adidas Superstar “Breathe Pink” is its rejection of permanence. Its color fades in sunlight, its materials shift with time, its appearance changes with each step. It’s a sneaker in motion—always evolving, never fixed. And in an age where fashion often feels performative, that kind of quiet authenticity is a radical thing.
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