Fresh off the Factory Floor
Behold, the FAC51-Y3. No, it’s not a late addition to the musical catalogue of Mancunian record label Factory Records, clearly, but a highly limited trainer from Y-3 (the brand created by adidas and Yohji Yamamoto), devised especially to celebrate the twenty-fifth anniversary of legendary Manchester nightclub The Haçienda. The shoe’s design is a collaboration between Peter Saville (the original Factory Records graphic designer), Ben Kelly (the architect who designed the original Haçienda interiors) and Joy Division/New Order bass player, Peter Hook.
hacienda Y-3 sneaker FAC51-Y3
The trainers come in a custom six-sided, maple-bottomed box (the same shape as the Haçienda’s dancefloor) and will be wrapped in four sheets of tissue paper – two will feature Kevin Cummins’ photography of the club in its late 80s heyday, one will be adorned with Ben Kelly’s original design sketches for the Haçienda’s interior, while a fourth will reflect how the space looks today.
A DVD documenting a discussion between Kelly, Saville and Hook sharing anecdotes about the club, Factory Records and how they feel about that time in their lives 25 years on will also be included in the package – an excerpt from which is being taken especially for CR Blog. (We will post it up here as soon as we can).
The shoe, strictly limited to just 250 pairs, will be sold exclusively in the Y-3 Manchester store for two weeks before it goes on sale in Y-3’s Shop-in-Shop at Selfridges London, Y-3’s flagship store in Tokyo and other selected retailers worldwide. Best save up though, the FAC51-Y3 will be priced at a cool £345.
Here’s a pair of FAC51-Y3s sitting on an original slab of metal plate from the Haçienda’s industrial-chic pillars with some wood from the original dancefloor…
