Bronx-based footwear designer Jae Tips is looking back at his colorful body of work and showcasing a new chapter with Saucony at a New York City pop up located at 55 Delancey Street, brought to life in partnership with StockX and Chase for Business from Thursday through Sept. 1.
The designer and artist is celebrating the sixth anniversary of his brand, Savior Worldwide, and his sixth collaborative collection with the running-focused athletic brand Saucony. The pop-up showcases the evolution of his work, gathering his unique sneakers together in one place.
NYC pop-up celebrating six years of Jae Tips’ Savior Worldwide.
His latest collection with Saucony, called Flowers Grow Uptown, is influenced by nature in his native New York City borough of the Bronx. Four sneaker colorways inspired by specific plants include Virginia Creeper, Sugar Maple, Perilla and Poison Ivy.
He explained the inspiration behind the collection to FN at a press preview for the pop-up, sharing, “I always try to tell intentional stories. To me, Flowers Grow Uptown — it feels like that should be my biography, because just being a kid from the Bronx, that, you know, a lot of gloominess, a lot of darkness and being able to be the plant or the flower that grows out of the concrete. And I just wanted to tell a story that’s just showing where a lot of us can’t overcome our circumstances, and then some of us really turn something into something beautiful.”
He sees the lives of plants as reflective of our own human experiences. “I’ve always been a fan of plant life, wildlife,” he said. “I love following people on IG that are plant parents, that have a whole house full of greenery. But to me, I’ve always just used the significance of wildlife to be able to relate it to how our lives go and how we age, and we have processes and things like that. And I just find it magnificent. I just like to marvel at it and just figure our how it relates to us.”
NYC pop-up celebrating six years of Jae Tips’ Savior Worldwide.
He continued to explain the design process and his thoughts on his relationship with Saucony. “So it’s four different shoes, we wanted to cover the processes of plants,” he said. “We used different materials because sometimes when you touch a plant, you don’t really know how it feels, so I wanted to show texturing and things like that. I’m excited. It’s a big, big burden and a big, big opportunity to let a brand let you drop four shoes, that means they believe in you a lot, so I’m happy to be here.”
On Sundays, the pop-up will host Savior Sundays, a weekly gathering offering food, music and one-on-one business mentorship. Food will be offered by Sweet Chick, while matcha and coffee will be offered by Ludlow Coffee Supply, and a lineup of DJs will bring summertime music to the space. An affirmation wall with Jae Tips’ Savior flower symbol will be a place where guests can express dreams and goals during the day.
Jae Tips shared how it feels to look back at his body of work all together in one place, and how he hopes people will engage with the pop-up.
“I’m proud of myself,” he said. “I’m proud of myself because every single project, every single inch of the room, is something I had to either work on overnight, or long nights or long days, or really, really put a lot into it. So I’m just happy to kind of encapsulate it and let people come in, whether they want to shop or they just want to see a piece of my history all in one place.”
For the inaugural Savior Sunday on Aug. 10, Chase for Business is presenting JPMorgan Chase Coaching for Impact: Office Hours for Entrepreneurs, providing one-on-one business coaching sessions intended to support up-and-coming creatives and founders; those interested can sign up for a 15-minute session here. Another Savior Sunday feature is that the first 25 visitors will receive a custom scratch-off card giving them the chance to win StockX site credits.
NYC pop-up celebrating six years of Jae Tips’ Savior Worldwide.
Jae Tips sees StockX as a good partner for this endeavor as the sneaker reselling platform has “been a part of the journey,” holding a place in his past and future as well. And StockX likes the way the designer prioritizes connecting with people.
“There’s a lot of reasons to team up with Jae Tips,” said Brendan Dunne, senior director of customer community and engagement at StockX. “One of the things that I appreciate so much about his work and him as a person is that he’s super community oriented and he’s done these things, whether they’re here in New York where he’s from, or in Paris, where people are popping out and congregating around sneakers, he’s just done these things that show that he’s willing to be outside and connect with people on a street level. And we’re super invested in that at StockX as well. So he was a perfect partner in that regard.”
NYC pop-up celebrating six years of Jae Tips’ Savior Worldwide.