In third grade, three friends and I started our own gang: the Converse Cousins. We were the only ones at our school who hadn't gone in for the just-launched Air Jordans and their countless imitations. The fact that we stuck with our thin, thrifty Chucks assured us that we were different, cool, somewhere between the jocks and the drama kids. So did the fact that we could change colors whenever it was time for a new pair and scrawl the names of our favorite bands on the white toe caps. The Converse Cousins walked the grounds of Westlake Elementary proudly (albeit without much in the way of arch support), knowing we followed in the footsteps of unfuckwithable stars from Larry Bird to Ice Cube to the Ramones.As I write, I'm wearing a pair of putty-gray high-tops; a glance around the PAPER office reveals a dozen other iterations, high and low, black and pink, Taylor and Purcell. Clearly, the Converse Cousins had other chapters around the world. As the years went by, we all stuck with the design we knew and loved but started fitting them out with insoles -- perhaps one of the most common signs that a certain breed of cool-kid was finally growing up.
And now, along comes a development both simple and profound: after almost a century of not fixing what was never broke, Converse introduces the Chuck Taylor All Star II, a model that mostly looks the same on the outside (the biggest giveaways are the premium canvas, the subtly retooled eyelets and the patch, now stitched on instead of painted) but that boasts a handful of minutely conceived internal tweaks that give each pair the feel of a Nike. A cushy Lunarlon footbed, a padded, no-slip tongue and a breathable microsuede lining are just a few of the innovations design director Damion Silver and his team obsessed over. Their goal: to raise feel and style to the same timeless level; to make cool-kids of all ages a little surer on their feet."The All-Star has become one of the world's most legendary sneakers, with fans, artists and musicians adopting the sneaker as a badge of creativity and self-expression," Silver explains. He sums up the Chuck II with a simplicity that matches the shoe itself: "They help you do more of what you do."
