Sneaker Trends: The Dos & Don’ts in 2019

The resounding popularity of sneakers has made them a necessity in pretty much everyone’s weekly rotation of shoes. Sneakerheads aren’t an odd and underground sub-culture anymore, since it seems like a huge glut of the population is more aware of sneakers and brands than ever before.

Some of the trends on this list are continuing from 2018 – but a couple of them are new. We’re going to stick to the more stylish among these trends, since we’d like our readers to look their best, but one or two might be cautionary tales of trends to avoid like the plague.

Minimalist Sneakers

Shoes to Grab: Adidas Stan Smith, Nike All Court, Vans Era.

Nike All Court 2

Minimal sneakers that are generally monochromatic in colour will keep on ‘keeping-on’ in 2019 – which is a good thing. The benefit to the minimal sneaker trend is that it’s very difficult to get them wrong. They’re universal monochromes, generally suit almost every age, and can be dressed up or down to suit different occasions. If you’re just familiarising yourself with sneakers at the moment, the minimal sneaker trend is a safe bet to start your sneaker adventures with.

The Classics

Shoes to Grab: Nike Internationalist, Asics Gel-Lyte V, Nike Air Force One, Jack Purcell.

Asics Gel-Lyte V

Retro sneakers have had a breakneck resurgence over the last 18 months – but this is a little bit of a patchier trend because not all retro silhouettes necessarily look that great. The safe silhouettes, like the Nike Internationalist, are good to look into. But, some of the bulkier or less timeless kicks should be avoided because they’ll be out of favour within 12 months, and you want your sneakers to last longer than than.

Suede is In

Shoes to Grab: Converse One Star Suede, Adidas Gazelle Suede, Vans Old Skool.

Adidas Gazelle (Grey Suede)

Mixing up textures with sneakers is a good way to add some variety into your selection. You can have three pairs of white sneakers, and you may think that’ll be overkill, but if one pair is leather, one being canvas, and one suede, you’ll actually have a surprising amount of versatility available. Suede is a texture that’s pretty adventurous for a lot of buyers, so you’ll want to look for a shoe model that’s relatively simple, because the suede itself is what will give it some personality.

Techy Runners

Shoes to Grab: Nike Epic React Flyknit, Adidas Ultraboost, Nike HyperAdapt 2.0.

Nike HyperAdapt 2.0

A lot of the big companies like Nike and Adidas are pouring money into R&D to find the next big sneaker technology, some of their innovations are hits and some are misses. Overall, though, you can expect running shoes to be on the receiving end of a lot of tech-fueled makeovers, with one of the recent headline catching introductions being Nike’s self-lacing HyperAdapts. Now, don’t go assuming 2019 will be the year that you’ll suddenly find self-lacing systems on a bunch of shoes, but we’re not too far off from that reality quite yet.

Chunky old-school Sneakers

Shoes to Avoid: All of them.

Balenciaga Triple S.

This is a surviving trend from 2018 – but it’s one that we’ll categorically tell you to avoid. No matter how many celebs’ Instagram feeds you see this on, or how much marketing is dedicated to telling you some 90s monstrosity is actually cool – the chunky (read: massive and impractical) sneaker trend is like an extremely resilient virus. Hopefully we only need to endure being told this is acceptable for one more year before move onto another trend, preferably one that doesn’t make your eyes bleed.

So – most of what was stylish before seems to be likely to stay on trend for another year, but which sneaker trends are you most likely going to introduce to your own collection? Let us know!