Speaking personally, there’s nothing better than a nice clean pair of buttery suede Campus. It’s one of the more low-key adidas Originals lines that’s held a solid place within the brand for years. Having never really seen the spotlight as much as its sibling the Superstar or Stan Smith, it’s one of those underrated shoes that’s always been perennial. 

Upon researching we found a variation of the standard suede we’re used to seeing. A leather training shoe under the same name was released as a brother of sorts to the Gazelle, an all-around shoe built for a variety of sports.

Starting off properly on the basketball court back in the 1980s, the Campus arrived at a time when adidas was already doing great things in the sporting world. The Superstar’s textured toe-piece was already turning heads alongside the elevated Pro Model, and on the football side, Gazelle reigned supreme.

The ‘80s and ‘90s saw a boom within the world of Hip Hop. Different variants of sportswear were being worn and marketed left, right and centre, and some of the most iconic performance products from brands were being re-appropriated with style as the significant USP. Photographer Glenn E. Friedman was responsible for capturing a young Adam Horowitz and Mike Diamond (Ad-Rock and Mike D) wearing pairs of Campus for the Check Your Head album cover, which no doubt helped raise the profile of the suede low-top.

Further down the line, some great releases have added extra clout to the Campus lineage. Hip Hop outfit House of Pain created their own Irish-themed tribute, a full reflective 3M treatment that appeared to kick off a popular material trend that others followed and premium Consortium level workings by Footpatrol, BAPE & UNDFTD and Japanese design heavyweight Kazuki Kuraishi have also helped elevate the silhouette. 

The size? exclusive Treatment

Back in 2021, we reworked the Campus 80 with a bunch of homages to David Fincher’s cult classic Fight Club. Throughout the trainer, there is an abundance of features that nod to different bits of iconography from the film. We opted for an asymmetric model to make sure the homage was complete. The right shoe nods to Tyler Durden, The Narrator’s split personality. His well-known shirt pattern is replicated on this shoe, with fur 3-Stripes and Hustler lettering on the lateral sidewall.

The left shoe features references to The Narrator, nodding to his oxford shirts, iconic sticker and the chaotic ‘Project Mayhem’. Cigarette burns are used as the top eyelet, and smoky midsoles add to the array of visuals. This shoe is an attempt to re-tell this legendary story, and to finish off the package, the shoebox referenced the iconic pink soap from the film. A definite collector’s item. 

More recently, our ‘City Flip’ pack bonded two existing shoes from our 2010 and 2020 Anniversary City series and draped an alternative model; the Campus 80s – a canvas made for a creative rework. Boasting a “change of skin” concept to each pair’s leather uppers, each original city colourway eventually fades away in time and with wear, revealing a new city’s fully clad. A particularly unique collaboration between ourselves and the German sportswear giants.

Shop our adidas Originals Campus collection at size? now.