Marcel Winatschek

Three Stripes, a Fanzine, Some People Worth Reading

Brand publishing is usually a waste of everyone’s time—marketing formatted to look like editorial, interview questions managed to within an inch of their lives, the whole thing assembled to move product while performing sincerity. Adidas Originals made a fanzine called adidas Originals Series with the London collective ArtSchoolVets, and it mostly avoids that trap.

The first issue has an interview with David Fischer, who built Highsnobiety from a sneaker blog into something that actually shapes how streetwear gets covered globally. There’s a piece on Laura Lee, bassist for Khruangbin, the Houston trio that sounds like it was recorded in an imaginary Southeast Asian country in 1974. And a profile of Sarah Gottschalk, who runs the German fashion and culture blog This Is Jane Wayne with the kind of consistent editorial instinct that’s genuinely rare in that space.

It’s a promotional object, obviously—Adidas made it, Adidas benefits from it. But it’s a well-made one, and the people in it are worth the time regardless of what they’re wearing.