If there’s someone on the American fashion scene befitting the title Don, then it would be C. To be specific, Don C, or Don Crawley, who’s been moving about culture’s upper echelons for decades. In 2011, he founded his own brand Just Don, which is now available at Footshop. The price tags might be alarming at first, but that’s exactly why I’m glad you’re reading this. We’re going to take a closer look at the brand that’s seemingly connected to everything in street culture.
For starters, we have to include a bit of history. Don C was born in Chicago, and it’s been closely intertwined with his work. Another Chicago native is Kanye West, one of Crawley’s best friends – Don C was Kanye’s witness at his wedding. Their friendship is both personal and professional – for some time, Don C was Kanye’s manager and also the boss of the G.O.O.D Music recording studio – this is the label Kanye started some 17 years ago. The two also collaborated on Kanye and Jay-Z’s joint album Watch the Throne – it was during this album’s studio sessions that Don C started experimenting with his drive to be a designer, and founded the Just Don brand.
From its inception, the brand’s main driving force was an effort to create sports clothes with added value. Crawley didn’t agree with Karl Lagerfeld’s legendary sweatpants quote. On the contrary, he tried elevating a style based on functionality and comfort into a higher sphere. One of Just Don’s main domains is sports team clothing, with basketball in the spotlight, featuring dresses honoring Don’s native Chicago, but the brand also branches out into other large American sports organizations such as the MLB.
FROM ITALY TO FOOTSHOP
As far as sneakers go, one of the brand’s biggest hits is undoubtedly their remake of the Air Jordan 2 silhouette, titled Beach. This was back in 2015 and Don C transformed an originally basketball sneaker into elegant footwear. Today, you’d be lucky to find it under $700, which just goes to show their massive success.
As a matter of fact, most of Just Don’s sneakers originate from the AJ2 silhouette. This summer, Don C introduced his own sports sneakers, titled the Just Don Courtside Tennis MID JD2 and BSKTBL JD1, both of which are available at Footshop. Handmade in Italy from premium materials, these unconventional lifestyle sneakers are the Ferrari of the sneaker world – and not just figuratively, the shoes feature several details that are directly inspired by the Ferrari 512 Testarossa, Michael Jordan’s prized vehicles.
Today, Don C primarily focuses on his brand as well as a couple of side projects – for one, he’s the co-owner of Chicago’s conceptual RSVP gallery along with Virgil Abloh. So to sum him up, Don C is behind some of the biggest music projects of the 21st century, he created one of the most coveted AJ2’s in the world, he’s a gallerist, and his work is a fusion of the worlds of sports, cars and comfort, and you can now own all of that in a pair of sneakers.
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