Why the iconic adidas tennis sneaker still holds court.

Sneaker trends are becoming increasingly frenetic these days (not to mention a little absurd), so there’s a lot to be said for casual footwear that endures the sartorial tumult. In this regard, there are few sneakers more stoic than the unassuming adidas Stan Smith. Favoured by everyone from Ms Phoebe Philo during her tenure as creative director at Céline to Mr John Lennon when The Beatles recorded “Strawberry Fields Forever”, the clean-lined, unpretentious shoe is an everyman sneaker for the ages. It belongs to the French B-boys who wore them in the Parisian suburbs in the 1990s as much as it does to the fashion editors and designers who wear them today.

But what of Mr Stan Smith, the man responsible for the shoe? A celebrated former tennis player and Grand Slam master, the 71-year-old American’s sporting legacy is often overshadowed by the namesake sneaker he helped design, but that doesn’t mean the man himself isn’t worth getting to know – something that’s possible in a new book compiled by Mr Smith himself, entitled Stan Smith: Some People Think I’m a Shoe. The book’s playful title comes from an interaction that shared with his son: “Of all the questions I have been asked, perhaps the most entertaining was from my son Trevor, at the age of eight, who very innocently asked, ‘Dad, was the shoe named after you or were you named after the shoe?’”

Packed full of personal anecdotes from Mr Smith himself as well as testimonies from a litany of his sneaker devotees, the 336-page book is an insight into and celebration of the shoe’s legacy, charting its beginnings on the tennis court to its now-uninhibited proliferation.

Mr Raf Simons writes: “I have a personal connection with the Stan Smith, as it is fair to say that for 10 years, from my teens well into my twenties, I didn’t wear any other shoes – only Stan Smiths.” One of the most seminal images in the book is a photograph of Mr David Bowie taken by Lord Snowdon in June of 1978; Mr Bowie reclines on a white bench wearing chinos and Stan Smiths (without socks, in case you were wondering). Mr Smith also considers himself something of a sneakerhead: “I guess that I have become somewhat of a modern sneakerhead, since my closet is full of both every day and rare shoes that all happen to be Stan Smiths.”

Perhaps most appealing about the book is that it shows the Stan Smith sneaker in all of its democratised glory. Although the shoe is no longer regarded as appropriate for playing pro tennis in, it’s a piece of footwear that’s comfortably transcended its sporty history and is now something loved the world over. We could recommend some things you could wear the sneakers with, but in Stan Smiths’ case, anything – and anyone – goes.

Stan Smith: Some People Think I Am A Shoe (Rizzoli International Publications) by Mr Stan Smith is out now

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