Illustrator’s Top 5: Sam Coldy
Second in our Illustrators’ Top Five series is Brighton-Born/London-based illustrator, photographer and all-round good guy Sam Coldy. His work consists of hand-drawn pastel colours and vintage typography mixed in with detailed and delicate patterns. He also likes football a lot, so when we asked him to to a top 5 we pretty much knew football-based drawings were on the cards.
Coldy says he’s average when it comes to playing football, and doubts football boots change the way you play the game, but he has his favourites. So here are Sam Coldy’s top five favourite football boots in no particular order. A pre-warning from Sam – “This will probably be really boring to most of you, sorry in advance.”
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1. Adidas Copa Mundial
It’s a classic, the daddy of all boots. Molded studs unlike the Adidas World Cups. Simple, comfortable and classy, so for these reasons the Copa Munidal’s make it into my top 5. It’s so hard to find black and white boots these days, most are ludicrously fluoro coloured and patterned with graphics. I’ve recently hung these boots up for the following boot.
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2. Nike 360CTR Maestri
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In my opinion the best boot made for a long time. One of the most comfortable boots on the market and so good looking. Nike dropped these about 18months ago and they’ve been a huge success, very popular boot, the likes of Cesc Fabregas, Florent Malouda and Andres Iniesta play in them. Supposed to help with control, so they’re a little gimicky. I’ve had these for a few months now, and love them. I’m not too keen on the new style, Maestri II. Only disappointment is that they don’t come in a solid black with a white swoosh.
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3.Adidas Predator Accelerator
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It was a tough call between these and the Adidas Predator Manias. I settled on the Accelerators simple because they’re more interesting to draw. I think Predators were the first boots to introduce ‘Blades’ instead of studs, but don’t quote me on it. At the time I remember blades being really cool, everyone wanted them. The Mania’s and Accelerators were good solid boots, comfortable and fairly durable. The Mania’s removable blades did start to get loose over time though. I’ve owned the Predator; Touch, Accelerator’s, Precision’s and Mania’s. I never used to wear anything else, until they started to look like plastic space shoes, which is why I switched to the Copa Mundials. You can buy old Predators on ebay, but they’re way out of my price range.
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4. Nike Tiempo 94′s
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I think this was Nike’s first ever football boot, until then Nike didn’t compete in the ‘soccer’ market for boots. Since then they’ve become a classic boot. I’ve never played in the 94′s but have used the more recent Tiempo’s and loved them. Another simple and comfortable boot, so they make it into my top 5. Nike recently relaunched the original 94 boot last year, and it’s beautiful. I love the classic uppercase Nike written on the back of the heel. Awesome.
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5. Nike Air Mercurial R9′s
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France 98, this is the first world cup I can really remember, I was a little bit too young for Italy 94, or perhaps football fever hadn’t set in by then. If you remember France 98, then you’d remember these boots. El fenómeno was going to win Brazil the world cup, but some how things didn’t go to plan. Anyway, Nike made the blue, yellow and silver R9′s for Ronaldo. The boot then went on to be developed into the Mercurial Vapor’s that are hugely popular today, and come in bizarre colour ways, all of which are way too fancy for my liking, but the R9′s are the originals and maybe the first boot to be made for a specific player, and what a player he was. Really lightweight boots made for one of the greatest footballers ever have to make it into my top 5.
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Special mentions to Umbro Speciali’s (another classic boot), Puma Kings (classics – I had these in red for some reason) and any boot that comes blacked-out (stealthy, understated and badass)
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