So since the age of about 16 I've exclusively bought Adidas gazelles and Doc martens for every pair of shoes.
They're super durable and relatively timeless. At one point I could make a rainbow with all of my gazelles, but I outgrew a few pairs.
Yesterday however I happened upon something new. Adidas went and teamed up with parley for the ocean to release a range of shoes made from ocean plastic and well...
The city sock 1 is a hybrid shoe sock knitted on the Adidas 3D knitting machine with reformed ocean plastic and I LOVE IT
THE THING IS FREAKING AWESOME
But as per usual one thing matters above all, is it sustainable?
Short answer yes
Long answer no
At first I was sure Adidas had cracked net positive production, (a product which has a positive effect on the environment) but at second glance the shoe is a result of bonding multiple different plastics permanently.
Yes it uses some of the famous sea plastic which is killing our oceanlife, but how much is never specified.
The process of reincorporating the waste is energy hungry and the resulting fibre does not retain its value through disposal.
Thus it is destined to return to the sea from which it came.
I guess that's technically closed loop, but at some point in this loop it could probably kill a few animals so yeah not great.
Still, nice kicks.
The printed product number is a nice emotionally durable feature, but they can't be fixed when they break so it's kinda useless.