Still Wanting

Casey Neistat walks into Stadium Goods like someone who doesn’t need anything—because he doesn’t—and immediately starts talking about Yeezys and Nike collabs like someone who spent actual time caring about these things before money let him own everything. That detail is what stays with me. Not the three grand in shoes, but that he seemed to actually want them.

He came up on YouTube doing something that looked like real work: documenting his own life, selling an app to CNN, understanding that the visual internet mattered before everyone else caught on. Now he runs 368, a studio in Manhattan where artists can make videos—which is what you do when you’ve already won and you’re not sure what to do with the rest of it besides keep building. Some people buy boats. Neistat builds infrastructure.

On Sneaker Shopping he moves through the store talking about skateboard culture and Kanye the way someone talks about things they actually spent time with. The Yeezy Powerphase, the Acronym × Nike Air Presto Mid, the Off-White × Nike Zoom Fly. Three thousand dollars and it never feels like performance, just like want. Maybe that’s all that separates taste from a credit card: being able to buy the same specific things you would’ve wanted anyway.