Marcel Winatschek

Between Two Timelines

Puma had this launch for the RS-0 in Berlin—a running shoe trying to matter as streetwear. They filled a space with arcade cabinets, the games everyone remembers, and served drinks while people looked at shoes. The design works. Old Puma genes, some future language in the lines, that archive green. Everyone was dressed like they’d solved this problem last year and didn’t care anymore.

The shoe just sits between two timelines. Not cheap nostalgia, not pretending to be something new. It evolved from what was there before. I have no idea if streetwear people will actually care about a running shoe if you tell them it’s a running shoe, but here it looked fine.

The arcade games were real—people played them instead of being ironic about them, which almost never happens. Nico Adomako played music. The usual Berlin thing: everyone fashionable by default, nobody trying. Cold beer.

I left thinking the shoe was good but the concept—past plus future—is just marketing-speak for describing right now. We’re living in that aesthetic already. The shoe looked right though. That’s the only part that actually matters.