A new shoe has been pacing the streets in recent years. Call them pillow slippers, foam shufflers, or cushion slides, these smoothed chunks of squishy EVA plastic look like indoor slippers or shower shoes, but boy, have they been leaving the house.
Takashi Murakami has noticed (or, at least, someone in his orbit has) because the master of artistic commercialization has pounced by releasing his own. Kaikai Kiki, Murakami’s company, seems equally confused in how to label the shoes, describing them variously as “an inventive take on footwear” or “a striking take on the Japanese house slipper” in a press release.
The apricot version of the Ohana Full-Bloom shoe. Photo: Photo: courtesy Ohana Hatake.
What’s clearer is Kaikai Kiki’s commitment to the venture. It’s partnered with Violet St, footwear business experts, and launched an independent footwear brand Ohana Hatake—the first time, it claimed, an artist has done so. The news follows on from Kaikai Kiki’s successful limited-edition drop earlier in the year through Complex, the sneakerhead news site and marketplace.
The brand’s first two “original silhouettes” are a stripped back shoe Surippa Ohana for which full details are pending and the Ohana Full-Bloom, which dropped on Complex in vibrant green and lemon yellow back in March and now arrive in apricot and raspberry rose. The shoes feature Murakami’s signature smiling flower motif on the front and are ridged like a crueller donut. Call them flower flops. They are described as “easy to clean” and “durable and softer-than-ever” and will be available on November 15 for $120 for winners of a raffle.
Close-up of the Ohana Full-Bloom shoe in Raspberry Rose. Photo courtesy Ohana Hatake.
The first of Ohana Hatake’s simpler Surippa Ohana line will be released at the pop culture festival ComplexCon, which will be hosted by Travis Scott in Las Vegas in mid-November. Ohana Hatake is set to host a booth at the festival and the line’s first color is rust, a nod to the slide in KaiKai Kiki’s studio.
Though Murakami has long collaborated on products including t-shirts with Uniqlo, clogs with Crocs, and watches with Casio, the launch of Ohana Hatake represents a more concerted retail effort. The brand name Ohana Hatake means field of flowers and, according to Murakami, is inspired by the Japanese manga series Frieren: Beyond Journey’s End, which first ran in 2020. At one point in the show, Flamme, a great mage, teaches the main character Frieren how to create a field of flowers, a spell that though not especially useful remains valuable.
Takashi Murakami with his new shoes. Photo courtesy Ohana Hatake.
“There is an episode which shows how using this spell had led Frieren to encounter the hero Himmel,” Murakami said in a statement. “Watching this scene in the anime, I was moved to tears, and I felt gratified by my long dedication to the flower motif in my artwork.”
A wider release alongside a global retail partner will roll out in 2025 and one wonders if Murakami will be similarly moved when he inevitably stumbles upon strangers wearing his multicolored flower flops out in the world.
