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Design by Future Sole Winner Juan Carlos Pozo
Matt: Who has pushed you the hardest at Jordan Brand?
D’Wayne: I would have to say everybody quite honestly. From the design team, to the product marketing team, to the development team – I would say everybody. That’s really what we do – we push each other. But purely from a design standpoint, I would say learning from the younger designers. Not only the team that I work with, but even some of the Nike guys, as well as Tinker of course. And I would have to also say it’s that drive as a designer to create something better than your previous work. If you have the kind of discipline and the will to be better, then you will always be a good designer and you always want to out do yourself. I never found myself competing with anybody but myself. Plus, designing a shoe for Michael Jordan…you have to be dead if you don’t get amped up for that.
Matt: You mentioned Tinker, and I have to ask, what influence does he still have around the office at Jordan Brand?
D’Wayne: I would say that Tinker is the Michael Jordan of footwear design. He’s always available for myself or anyone from the Jordan Team wants to go talk to him and pick his brain on a product or just to soak up any knowledge that you can from him. Because, really, he started this whole thing. And to have a resource like him, and a mentor like him, a few hundred feet away from you and you don’t take advantage of the opportunity to soak up the knowledge that he has acquired over time, that’s a huge waste if you don’t do that. He’s a phenomenal guy. I know he doesn’t do that many interviews or you don’t see him that much, but he’s a really good dude. I would say he is one of my few mentors that I have in this industry. I only have a few and he is my design mentor. I can’t really put it to words, but he is just really a good dude and he is always accessible whenever I need him for something even if its just to say “hi” he’s always available. So it is a blessing to have that sort of guy around to learn from.
Matt: Something you had a major hand in last year that helped develop young talent was Future Sole . Will we see that project again?
D’Wayne: Yes, we are working on it right now. Last year it started in January, but this year its going to start a little bit later this time around. We are looking to add a few new wrinkles to the contest this year with some online voting where the consumers and the fans get to select who wins we’re going to do some pretty cool things with providing some unique templates. It’s coming along and should kick off in the first quarter of this year.
It’s a cool project that started under the radar and we found a lot of talented people out there that want to design sneakers. For me it was a great honor to provide that kind of opportunity for kids out there because I wish that I had something like that when I was growing up. I was just like those kids sitting at home drawing shoes and collecting pages and pages of artwork. Now there’s an outlet for this talent. I think kids can see that you can make a career out of designing shoes and make some pretty good money. Ultimately, if you get to that point where you are working and doing something that you love, making good money at it, I think that is the best position to be in. Hopefully we will discover some more kids and hopefully we can get them on the right track, get them some proper guidance and mentoring, get them into college and get them into the brand one day whether it’s Nike or Jordan.
Matt: D’Wayne, thank you again for taking time out of your busy schedule to speak with us.
D’Wayne: Not a problem.
