Air Nikes and their outdoor sandals and other high performance shoes, brought applied science to the court and the hiking trail. Nike produced shoes whose strange, bulbous shapes were justified by their function, and whose form translated the firm s celebrated logo into a three-dimensional object. In recent years, firms such as Adidas have come to compete with Nike in this arena. Others, such as New Balance, have sought to offer a more disciplined and balanced alternative to the expressiveness that is the hallmark of Nike. Still others, such as Tommy Hilfiger and Ralph Lauren, have applied the lessons of the athletic shoe industry to the realm of high fashion.
Shoes change every season.
New materials and technologies continue to come to the fore. Computer aided design and production have freed designers to create more outlandish forms that can still be mass produced. While the field is now more diverse, the level of innovation and the pace of change remain higher here than in almost any other field of design.