Nike started selling sneakers from its new Space Hippie collection. The footwear is constructed from factory and post-consumer waste that the sportswear company calls 鈥渟pace junk.鈥� Space Hippie consists of four different silhouettes: 01, 02, 03, and 04. Nike鈥檚 manufacturing process for the footwear uses around 85鈥�90% recycled polyester yarn, recycled foam, and a blended 鈥淐rater foam.鈥澛燭he result is a design that has a low carbon footprint, the company said.
Engineered knits in the Space Hippie 02 uppers are created from 鈥淪pace Waste Yarn鈥� that Nike designer Noah Murphy-Reinhertz described as 100% recycled material including recycled plastic water bottles, T-shirts, and yarn scraps. Combined with other elements in that sneaker design, the upper is 90% recycled content by weight, he added.
鈥淭he tooling of all Space Hippie shoes, created with 鈥楥rater foam,鈥� is made with a blend of standard Nike foams and 15% Nike Grind rubber,鈥� he explained on the company鈥檚 website. 鈥淭he reduction in virgin material gives a lower carbon footprint.鈥�
Cushioning for the Space Hippie footwear contains recycled ZoomX foam. Nike takes factory scraps from the production of the Vaporfly 4% running shoe and reprocesses that foam in a way that uses about half the carbon dioxide equivalent as typical Nike foams, Murphy-Reinhertz said.
鈥淲e believe the future for product will be circular,鈥� Nike鈥檚 VP of sustainable innovation Seana Hannah said. 鈥淲e must think about the entire process: how we design it, how we make it, how we use it, how we reuse it and how we cut out waste at every step. These are the fundamentals of a circular mindset that inform best practices.鈥�