Tokyo (SCCIJ) – The Swiss shoe and accessories label Bally, a 167-year-old brand from Switzerland, and the Grammy-award winning British music producer Swizz Beatz have come together again for a limited-edition collaboration in Swiss luxury sportswear. Following on the heels of the successful Ricardo Cavolo X Swizz Bally collection collaboration, the global entrepreneur has tapped London-based street artist SHOK-1 to create a limited-edition capsule collection featuring the artist’s best-known pieces on RTW and Accessories. The global premiere of the collection took place in Tokyo in the presence of many VIPs including the Japanese tennis star Naomi Osaka.
Many celebrities at Tokyo event
Celebrating the collection, the Swizz Beatz presents Bally x SHOK-1 capsule was launched in Tokyo with an event that brought fashion, street art, and music together, with guests including Bally CEO Frederic de Narp, Swizz Beatz, SHOK-1, tennis star Naomi Osaka, Caro Daur, Mimi Xu, Linda Tol, Shini Park, kabuki performer Shido Nakamura, models Taiki Takahashi and Noah Lee, and AMIAYA twins Ami Suzuki and Aya Suzuki and a musical performance by Nas.
As part of the collaboration, Bally’s Ginza flagship store has also been turned into an exhibition of SHOK-1’s art for the duration of the capsule.
Bally limited-edition collection
Spanning the entirety of the first floor of the store, the exhibition reflects the nature of the capsule – subcultures and street art co-opting and taking over brands, just as they did at the turn of the century with Bally. SHOK-1 also took over the streets of Tokyo creating his first Japanese mural, depicting the original artwork entitled ‘Monster X’ along the side of a building in the heart of Shibuya.
Music producer Swiss Beatz, tennis star Naomi Osaka, artist SHOK-1
Gravitation towards European luxury brands
Swizz Beatz aka Kasseem Dean founded the Dean collection in 2014, a collection of the art patrons’ own personal collection but also as a “discovery zone” for those who appreciate art from the established art greats to the up-and-coming talents. In 2017, Dean brought the concept to Bally to reignite the brand’s long-standing history of collaborating with artists. Growing up in hip hop’s golden era in the 1980’s, Dean and his fellow music lovers worshipped the Swiss brand, especially for its fly sneakers.
While Dean and collaborators like rapper DMX and Ruff Ryder records were growing up in the music scene of the Bronx, they gravitated towards European luxury brands such as Bally which weren’t exactly being aimed at the urban music scene. Simultaneously artist SHOK-1 was at the forefront of the street art movement in his native London, becoming one of the first Europeans to co-opt the movement that was in full force in the States.
History of collaboration with artists
Dean, fascinated with SHOK-1’s signature wall paintings, naturally thought the artist would be a great collaborator with the Swizz Beatz presents activation for Bally. The notoriously camera-shy SHOK-1 (as a spray-painting street artist) pioneered the craft with a difficult subject matter; X-rays. Having first received a degree in Applied Chemistry, the artist’s work is part art and part science. The effect of the technically difficult to execute paintings has created a world of dark beauties with a delicate finesse that gained the risk-taking artist critical acclaim for the last 30 years.
Highlighting a trio of SHOK-1’s most famous artworks – the ‘fly’, the ‘funk’ and ‘the consumer’ – the collection blends Bally’s expertise in luxury sportswear, Swizz Beatz musical influences and clashed them with SHOK-1’s X-ray art. The result is a capsule collection that reimagines some of Bally’s iconic pieces as subversive pieces of art. Sneakers such as the Galaxy retro sneaker are adorned with inkjet prints of ‘the consumer’, paired with translucent rubber soles while Bally’s signature leather sneakers feature UV-printed versions of the artworks atop tonal soles.
Ready-to-wear and accessories continue the application to luxury sportswear, utilizing complex techniques including 3D UV printing on leather jackets with laser-colored SHOK-1 logo detailing; 3D inkjet-printed details on leather bags and accessories; two-color embroidery on T-shirts and screen-printed, logo-detailed tracksuits.
Text and photos: Bally
