We have seen the pictures and heard all the rumours. Not content on the chinese whispers floating around, we asked Patta a little about the upcoming Asics Gel Lyte III collabo and were lucky enuff to get a couple of responses. Masta Lee gave us a run down of how the shoe came about and Gee...who is part owner of the business did the interview. Here is what they had to say.

Masta Lee

"As for the shoes, there's no romantic story behind it really: Patta has been in touch with Asics (Remco from Endorsed works there…) for a while now, so when the opportunity arose, we pitched the idea to collaborate with Asics on a shoe and they made it happen. We absolutely loved the Asics Gel Lyte III from the get go, so that was our first choice. After some brainstorming we decided to not go wild on colours and put focus on the materials."

"We used the classic weapon of Amsterdam as the main theme. The weapon of Amsterdam is a red shield with a black vertical bar in the middle containing 3 white crosses. We took those colours, put them on the shoe and added green to it as well, as that's the main colour for our Patta-logo's.
As for materials, we picked a premium matte red leather for the main parts, white perforated nubuck for the toe box and side panels, black suede side panels, 3M accents, premium matte green leather on the split tongue and black leather lining with the weapon's crosses printed on it."

"After wrapping that up, we thought about the extra's. The shoes will come with 3 sets of laces (plain green, black with white crosses and black with red and green accents) and different colour sock liners for the left and right shoe."

GEE's Interview

Tell us a little bit about Patta and the people involved and what ‘PATTA’ means…

Patta is a shop Edson and myself started in June 2004... We both have a background in music. Edson is a DJ…and I organise parties and used to be a host at a lot of parties too. Patta is Surinamese for sneaker (Surinam is a country in South America, next to Brazil). Surinam used to be a Dutch colony, that's why a lot of Surinam people live here. Both Edson and myself have a Surinam background... plus ‘Patta’ is common street slang for "sneakers" that everybody uses...

Next to Ed and I, we have Tim (Edson's brother) the floor manager, Walid the head of communications, Gary the buyer, Lee our computer guru (DJ and producer as well) and then Luc and Jazz.

We are located on the 2nd floor. On the first floor we have our homeboy Benny and his premium skate shop named ‘Ben G’. And also - Mr. Wix … who has his studio in the back. A top notch DJ, organiser and fashion icon!

Parra is the last part of our family, you know who he is...

Wow! That sounds like a cool environment to work at. I’ve actually been to Patta before and purchased some shoes. Back in 2004 I think. It’s a cool little store. Do you still have that gallery space on the ground floor?

Ha, the gallery!! Nah, Benny is renting that space now and started skate shop – ‘Ben G’ Keep an eye on him, he is coming up with some ill shit!

Ahh. Now it all makes sense. I think the pictures we’ve seen so far of the Asics Gel Lyte are awesome! So different yet so…err… Patta? Great follow up from the AM90 ‘Homegrowns’. Tell us a little about the inspiration.

Thanks for the props! We wanted to make a classic running shoe silhouette, basic, but yet flamboyant. We took the weapon of Amsterdam (a shield) and used that as the main inspiration. The weapon is made up of red and black with white crosses. That's the main colour scheme. The green is just the colour of our original logo, something we are known for – ‘Mean Patta Green’ nah mean?

The shoes will come with 3 sets of laces (plain green, black with white crosses and black with red and green accents), and different colour sock liners for the left and right shoe. We got some very special packaging and such lined up for it as well…

YES!!! The packaging is insane. Unfortunately I’m not allowed to show our Sneaker Freakers yet cos it hasn’t been confirmed.

Why the Gel Lyte III compared to say the GT-II or any other classic by Asics?

The GT-II is a nice shoe, but that one had already been done by Proper (a really dope collab by the way), plus we liked the silhouette of the Gel Lyte III better, it's a bit chunkier.

That Proper GT-II has got to be one of my favourites. But pretty much every second or third sneaker release now is a collaboration. Do you think the sneaker scene has gone too far with collaborations?

Not really... The bad ones I do mind. Man, I love doing a make up for a sneaker, but I have to feel it though. It has to have soul. It has to have an idea behind it.

What will be the next big thing in our scene?

Hahahaha! Plain and basic shit. Quality over colour, focusing on the use of materials.


Is it true that everyone in Amsterdam is a ‘stoner’…?

I guess we are. We are all sick individuals, but the crew and I are different, so we don’t smoke. Nah, it’s a misconception. We just don’t notice it too much because it's easy to do. Tourists like to talk about all that smoking stuff...


I’m sure every tourist who goes there has tried something or another. I know I did…haha!

One thing I did notice though was that most ‘Amsterdammers’ speak English better than most Aussies. Why does everyone in Amsterdam have an American accent when they speak English tho?

We learn English from television, videos, rap, movies etc. Most of these things are American, so we mimic that more then say English or Aussies... Get at me with some good Australian rap music and I will change it up!!!

You have to look out for an Aussie hip-hop band called ‘The Hilltop Hoods’. They are doing big things. So what can we expect next from Patta?

We are going to work on making our brand stronger. Other than that, just being ourselves.


What do you think of Rudd Van Nistelrooy?

Who? I couldn’t care less. He used to play for PSV... And now Real Madrid... Fuck that. I am with Ajax and Barcelona!


AWESOME!!! I hate him too now that he’s left Man. Utd….what a traitor.

Thanks for taking the time to do this interview. The entire Sneaker Freaker family will be keeping their eyes out for this shoe.

Respect!
SF

NB. These are still just pictures of the samples. Please note the sock liner will be different in the production ones and there might be one or two minor changes. Either way, you know that they will be very sought after. Don't sleep kids!