Sneaker heads show out at 'Sustainable Soles' event held in Thrive City

A sustainability event held at Thrive Center on Saturday focused on a key part of basketball culture: sneakers. 

Many folks don’t think too much about the lifecycle of our shoes, but at the "Sustainable Soles" event, upcycling shoes is all the rage.

"What’s amazing about the Bay Area is that we’re so creative," Adonal Foyle told KTVU. "Everything we use, we have to think about the cycle of that thing, so the idea that sneakers have been such a cornerstone in basketball, and now we’re talking about: how do we maintain that sustainability? And ensuring that we have an environment that is safe for the next generation. To be innovative and creative with how they bring shoes into the marketplace, but also how they dispose of them, and really thinking about the lifecycle of sneakers."

Foyle played for the Golden State Warriors for ten seasons, and now he spends his time giving back to the community. One way he does that is by donating his old sneakers, so they can have a new life instead of ending up in a landfill.

"I work with the Kerosene Lamp Foundation, that’s Adonal Foyle’s foundation," said Shomari Smith, artist and founder of E14 Gallery. "He does so much work in this community and his home island, Saint Vincent and the Grenadines."

You may recognize some of Smith's work, it’s been featured by the Warriors before. 

"I was fortunate enough to be one of the artists selected to have work inside the Chase Center," Smith said. 

Foyle says he’s thrilled his shoes—size 17 by the way—will be treasured and displayed as art pieces for years to come.  

"They’re size 17, I don't know much what to do with them. Many people cannot fit into a size 17!" Foyle said. 

Adonal Foyle's size 17 sneaker, painted by Oakland-based artist Shomari Stone for a charity auction.

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Oakland business working to build sustainable sneaker culture

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One Oakland business showed out at the event, sharing how they use painting, resoling and cleaning to increase the life of a pair of sneakers. 

"Instead of selling brands from big corporations, we’re now teaching people to reuse, clean, repair and even make their own sneakers, realizing there’s plenty of shoes in the world already," Jeff Perlstein of Sole Space Lab told KTVU. 

These efforts help keep sneakers from ending up in the landfill, where 300 million pairs of shoes end up each year.

Paint Them Kicks, another business at the event, was founded in the Bay Area by a mother and her twelve-year-old son. 

"I said Isaac, ‘Why don’t we open up a sneaker customization store where people can come and vibe and have birthday parties?’" Najeebah Spearman, founder of Paint Them Kicks told KTVU.  "So we’re all about building community." 

"We can think about the future and what that looks like together, and that community is a sustainable community, when you put in the effort and time," Foyle said.