The oral history of HTM

HTM represents the collaboration between Hiroshi Fujiwara, founder of fragment design and famous for his work in the Harajuku Street Fashion scene; Tinker Hatfield, Vice President of Creative Concepts and designers of the most iconic silhouette Nike; Mark Parker, Nike's President and CEO. This collaboration has seen the birth of 32 releases, which underline the goal of reinterpreting the most classical silhouettes, enhance new technologies and pave the way for future applications.

Through their words we want to go over these 14 years of experience and exclusive collaborations.

#1 HTM COLLABORATION DEBUTS IN 2002 WITH AN UNPRECEDENTED REINTERPRETATION OF NIKE AIR FORCE 1, BUT FROM WHERE THE NAME HTM ORIGINATES?

H: Other companies have used acronyms to stand for collaborations, so as a code name, I used HTM to represent Hiroshi, Tinker and Mark. But I never dreamed that would become the official name.

T: I’m pretty sure HTM ultimately was Mark’s idea. It strikes me in retrospect that this is right up his alley. He really knows how to bring the right people together.

M: We gave the project its own identity by putting our initials on it, which at first didn’t mean anything to most people when they saw it. But the name “HTM” represented each of our fingerprints on the process.

#2 WHAT ROLE MARK, HIROSHI AND TINKER COVER IN THIS EXCLUSIVE PROJECT?

T: Mark plays the role that he’s always played. He is a designer, but he’s also been a developer and has spent time in the lab. In addition, he’s always had the vision to choose the right people to work with and right projects to work on. He’s also a genius at refining, curating and reorganizing.

M:  We all have a different style and approach to our work, which I think makes the overall work much stronger. You could compare our process to a jazz jam session — like musicians riffing and building on one another’s ideas. Sometimes we go in with a specific idea that one of us has been obsessing, sometimes it’s more free-form. Hiroshi is more of a stylist-designer than he is a pure designer. He has a heightened sense of style, wearability and simplicity. He has a sharp eye for how design fits into everyday lifestyle. Tinker’s accomplishments speak for themselves. He helped usher a new level of personality into product, not just footwear, that the world had never seen.

#3 WHAT KIND OF OPPORTUNITY DID THE HTM PROJECT OFFER?

H: This was a time when luxury sneakers were not so common. So at the beginning, HTM became an opportunity to add a sense of luxury to sneakers.

T: At first, HTM was an exercise of using unexpected colors and materials to elevate classic designs.

M: With HTM, there aren’t really any constraints. We don’t have to worry about compromising materials or construction because we’re trying to hit a certain price point. We do things that we think make the shoe most interesting. So we probably go to places where the conventional process isn’t as comfortable going.

#4 HTM EVOLVES IN 2004 GIVING LIFE TO NIKE SOCK DART, WHICH REFERS TO THE INNOVATIVE SPIRIT OF THE NIKE SOCK RACER…

H: Later, in Japan, I saw it being sold. I repeatedly told Mark and Tinker that the shoe is futuristic and interesting and that we should bring it back. So we decided to elevate it with HTM.

T: I will tell you—one of the reasons I participate in a project of this nature is that it affords you the opportunity to unearth some gems that no one really paid attention to. By doing so, you can spark thought about future design. The Sock Dart helped people rethink some upcoming projects, as we were starting to work a lot with knit and this was such an advanced, futuristic shoe.

M: The Sock Dart resulted from Tinker’s team playing with circular knit machines. It was really part of the journey of sock-like product that began with the Sock Racer in the mid '80s.

#5 IN 2012, NIKE’S WORK WITH KNIT TOOK A MAJOR LEAP WITH THE INTRODUCTION OF ITS REVOLUTIONARY FLYKNIT TECHNOLOGY, WHICH LED TO THE LAUNCH OF THE NIKE HTM FLYKNIT RACER AND NIKE HTM FLYKNIT TRAINER +…

H: Flyknit shoes look so simple, but they are incredibly technical. I understood how amazing the technology was. But with early samples, it was hard to see if the shoe actually featured a knitted upper. In order to make the knit and seamless construction more visible, I advised the team to use colors to explain the concept, such as by mixing different colored yarns.

T: HTM afforded us the opportunity to somewhat ease a disruptive technology into the market. We could learn from the launch, get people to notice the technology, and then scale it from there. So that Flyknit release, to me, is the best example of HTM’s purpose and potential.

M: We could see the amazing potential [of Flyknit] right away. It was clear that we were rewriting the rules of performance engineering. When we saw the leap that could be made by using Flyknit instead of cut and sew, it was like comparing airbrush to collage. It’s so precise. Now we could micro-engineer whatever solution we wanted — support, flexibility or breathability — by manipulating both the yarns and the stitch patterns.

#6 IN 2014, HTM WORKS FOR THE FIRST TIME ON A BASKETBALL SHOE: THE KOBE IX ELITE LOW HTM…

H: The KOBE IX Elite Low HTM gave us the opportunity to celebrate how much Flyknit had evolved. What was first used for running could now be used for the intense, diagonal movements of basketball.

T: Of course I wasn’t really involved in the design of that shoe, but I was sitting next to Eric Avar throughout its development and I personally think that that’s one of the best-crafted, best-designed, best-tested products that we’ve ever put together. It’s a superb combination of technology and athlete insight.

M: Kobe is an athlete who always wants the latest innovation in his footwear, so it seemed fitting that his shoe would be the first signature athlete model we worked on as HTM. He was exited about it. He loves sneakers, so I think he enjoyed the connection to HTM.

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