Nike SB Takashi Dunks Restoration

History

The Nike SB Takashi Dunks made huge waves in the sneaker community. Takashi Hosokawa became the first japanese Nike SB Sales representative. It was Nike’s goal to get the Dunks in the skate community by teaming up with respected skate shops and skateboarders and their vision paid off. Them cosigning with Takashi Hosokawa, Supreme, and Danny Supa gave them the credibility they needed to get their foot in the skateboard sneaker industry and have now been a staple in sneaker culture for decades.

The Start

To start the restoration of these iconic Kicks, Vick begins replacing the soles by separating the uppers from the midsole and sole of the shoe. He does this by cutting the thread connecting the uppers from the lowers with an exacto knife which allows for easy separation. The next step is preparing these beat dunks for a reglue. To do this Vick skives the old glue off using an exacto knife to make sure that when he reapplies the glue that it sticks as good as possible. Which is also why after he finished skiving he used a dremel to roughen up the leather so the glue adheres to the suede material better.

Putting it Together

The next step in this restoration is removing the sole from our doner shoe. The doner shoe for these takashi dunks is the most hated shoe in the sneaker world today which is the classic panda dunk. Vick starts by cutting out the thread just like he did to the takashi’s and then letting the shoe sit in acetone. After letting it lay in the acetone the uppers are easily removed from the sole. There was still a little bit of excess glue so Vick used a metal drill bit on his dremel to get the rest of the old glue off. To make sure that the glue sticks to the best of its ability Vick sprays some adhesion promoter onto the shoe. Finally Vick replaces the Sole’s on these Takashi Dunks after applying glue to the doner sole and old uppers and heating up the glue for the perfect stick. Lastly Vick threads the uppers to the midsole to complete the sole replacement.

Squeaky Clean

Now that the midsole and soles are replaced it is time to do something about these cooked uppers. Vick uses the Reshoevn8r soft bristle brush and cleaning solution to bring back to life these 21 year old uppers. The suede is already looking better but using the Reshoevn8r dry suede brush Vick resets the leather, getting out all of the matted material to get the suede back to silky smooth. Next Vick uses an airbrush to repaint the faded black suede material on the upper. To make sure that the paint stays locked into the suede Vick uses the Reshoevn8r water and stain repellent to make sure it doesn’t rub off. You should also use the dry suede brush to brush in the new color coate into the suede to make sure it is painted evenly.

To finish the Restoration process Vick uses a regular paint brush to repaint the black leather all over the shoe. After letting it dry he then cleans up some of the miniscule details by cutting and burning some of the loose thread along with cleaning the insoles of these 03 Takashi Dunkls.

Video Link

This restoration is Complete and now these shoes that are legally allowed to get a drink look brand new. To see the complete restoration of these 2003 Nike Sb Takashi Dunks hit the link below.