Imagine growing up in Lexington, Kentucky, but never touching a horses. Now imagine getting a call from the city’s tourism board asking whether you can make sneakers for them. Marcus Floyd said yes before he knew what that meant. Four months later, Horse Kicks went globally viral, Nike’s lawyers came calling, his Instagram was deleted overnight. Despite all of this, a door opened to the equestrian world that he’s been walking through ever since.
Marcus is the artist behind Infinite Customs and Horse Kicks, with custom work for the cast of Power, Nelly, Coach K’s Nike retirement send-off, and Luka Dončić through an approved Jordan Brand collab. We get into how he built the first prototypes on a medicine boot, why he partnered with Equine Fusion to make his mass-produced design safe before making it stylish, what it takes for an outsider to earn trust with horse people, and what he learned only this year about his grandfather’s work as a groom. We also talk Paris Fashion Week, the Black cowboy moment in mainstream culture, a dream Disney collab, and his new podcast, Bad Mares Club.
Mentioned in this episode
Connect with Marcus on Instagram at @horse.kicks and @marcus_floyd_infinite
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