Liberty and Nike Collaboration

The latest Liberty and Nike event held at the Liberty store in Regent Street was the third time the luxury retailer has collaborated with the popular sports brand. The event was an exclusive sale of limited edition Nike shoes, designed using Liberty's geometric floral fabrics.

It's unsurprising this collaboration works well. Nike is clearly inspired by the rich variations of Liberty's fabrics as well as their well-established heritage, and Liberty want to tap into and appeal to Nike's cool, young, urban consumer. The poster campaign that supported the event was brilliantly crafted to look like those for an old-school boxing match, on which the designers placed Nike 'versus' Liberty as competitors. At the event itself, all the artists and illustrators of the fabrics attended as well as the shoe designers, and the posters continued to set each one up against each other: artist 'v' shoe.

This event is a classic example of how PR can effectively lead to product, which then leads to marketing, and I'm sure they will take this collaboration further to create a more rounded campaign. It makes sense for two very separate brands to unite; Nike becomes credible using the heritage of Liberty's content, and Liberty becomes cool with its brand image delivered to a wholly separate market.