From the Vault: Nike SB Dunk Low “Hemp”
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By Stadium Goods |From the Vault: Nike SB Dunk Low “Hemp”
Still smoking! A look at the first Nike SB Dunk release celebrating 4/20, from all the way back in 2004.
Matt DeSciora
Just because the internet was around when the Nike SB Dunk debuted in 2002, doesn’t necessarily mean that everything you read about the shoe online is true.
There are a few misconceptions about the Dunk out there, including the origins of its popular “4/20” series. Revisionist history says the “Skunk” Dunk from 2010 was the skate shoe’s first marijuana-inspired colorway, but the archives say otherwise. Before the “Skunk,” before the “Cheech & Chong,” and definitely before the “Reverse Skunk” and “Hawaii” colorways was 2004’s “Hemp Pack,” a set of three hemp based numbers released to coincide “a numerologically celebrated and significant day,” as so eloquently put by Nike SB.
We probably don’t have to tell you this if you’re reading an blog post about a rare Nike SB Dunk from almost two decades ago, but sneakers in colorways that celebrate holidays, no matter how farcical they may be, are now commonplace. That wasn’t the case in 2004. The “Hemp Pack,” which featured three colorways, broke new ground because it was a Dunk that wasn’t designed by a Nike SB team rider like the “Colors By” collection, nor a street artist or a skate shop, like many early aughts colorways.
Instead the “Hemp Pack,” particularly the “Green Hemp,” which popped up at the Stadium Goods photography team’s studio recently, leaned into a theme that’s inextricably woven into the fabric of skateboarding and popular culture: marijuana.
The “Green Hemp” plays up to its name with a 100% hemp constructed upper. The beige material allows for its bonsai-colored leather Swoosh, laces, and tongue tag to attract attention. A classic gum rubber midsole underneath the shoe pulls the look together. The other “Hemp” colorways also feature the same beige hemp upper and color blocking, just with different-colored accents—blue and maroon—replacing the green.
As is the case with so many Nike SB Dunks from back in the day, the “Green Hemp” was ahead of its time. Sneakers in materials other than leather and canvas are everywhere today, but were way less ubiquitous when the “Hemp” collection dropped. The “Green Hemp” and the other two colorways from the marijuana-friendly collection are another win for a former basketball shoe that almost didn’t make it out of the 1980s.