We Talked With UnheardOf Founder Phil Lipschutz About The Design Of The Adidas Rivalry “Grandma’s Couch 2”

Grandma’s Couch is getting a sequel! A couple of years back, Adidas linked up with the Cincinnati-based streetwear boutique, UnheardOf, for a special take on the Rivalry Lo silhouette, dubbed “Grandma’s Couch.” The sneaker was inspired by UnheardOf owner Phil Lipschutz’s grandma, Naomi Phillips, with a floral upper design pattern that took its design cues from Naomi’s couch, a respite for Lipschutz and his friends in his youth between skate sessions.

Based on the look alone, Grandma’s Couch was dope enough to warrant a sequel, but after a video of Naomi unboxing the original went viral, the deal was essentially done as sneakerheads were instantly charmed by Naomi’s personality. So Adidas and UnheardOf started working on the Grandma’s Couch 2 with Naomi herself helming the design. Sadly, Naomi passed away during the process, but Lipschutz and Adidas remained committed to honoring her legacy (and the legacy of dope grandma’s everywhere), and now, just in time for Mother’s Day, the Grandma’s Couch 2 will be hitting the UnheardOf store.

The Grandma’s Couch 2 looks even more fire than the original, with an embroidered floral design on the panels (handpicked by Naomi), blush pink suede panels, a gum sole, and “adidas” printed in Naomi’s handwriting, which is pretty significant considering the brand isn’t in the habit of letting designers restyle its name. Rounding out the design is a reproduction of the watercolor sketch her husband of 75 years used to propose to her on the insoles, and a personalized note from Lipschutz in reversed lettering (a reference to his dyslexia). The release comes in a special wooden box that resembles an old-school vintage makeup kit decorated with watercolor florals painted by her late husband.

Through its specific personal details, Grandma’s Couch 2 is undoubtedly a family affair and must be a bittersweet moment for Lipschutz, but in its specificity, its message is universal. This is a sneaker about honoring the women in our lives who helped raise us and always believed in us. We love collaborations that tell a story, and the story of the Grandma’s Couch 2 is the best one we’ve come across this year.

We linked up with Lipschutz ahead of the drop to talk about the design process of the Grandma’s Couch 2 and get the details on Naomi’s footwear game.

What is the significance of the colors and flowers chosen for this pair?

The flowers chosen on this particular colorway were flowers that my grandmother told me were her favorite that she grew in her garden.

One that sticks out specifically is the pink orchid, a flower that my grandma taught me how to maintain and take care of, but also one that I bought for her on Mother’s Day and Christmas the following years after they moved out of their house into their independent assisted living apartment once they got into their upper nineties… they couldn’t take their orchids with them, so I bought her one.

So the orchid really stands out because it’s a flower that will re-bloom. And the way my grandma taught me how to water it with the three ice cubes was a funny little trick that I thought she was lying about at first and then when I tried it and it worked, it was the only flower and plant that I ever was able to take care of myself.

How important was it to differentiate Grandma’s Couch 2 from the OG and fold Naomi into the design process? What was the original ethos going through this design?

Both Grandma’s Couch and the Mom’s Ugly Couch colorways were designed mostly by my grandma. My grandfather had input and helped in colorways, and he drew the flower that was on the insole of those original shoes.

After the release of the original Grandma’s Couch and Mom’s Ugly Couch Adidas Rivalry, the next weekend I went to my grandmother’s and told her that I wanted to make a Mother’s Day colorway for her to celebrate Mother’s Day.

We started picking out colorways and changing different flower patterns and making new flower patterns together. But she told me she didn’t want to do another release partly because her arm and shoulders hurt so bad from signing so many autographs. But I told her we still needed to mock the shoe up anyway, and we still needed to make a sample.

So for about three nights in a row, we colored up a bunch of shoes. I printed out templates and had her color it with colored pencils and crowns, and we researched on Google images, some of her favorite flowers, and we picked some of the flowers out of her apartment to use for inspiration to make the embroidered corduroy pattern that’s on the tongue and on the quarter panel of the shoes.

What was the process like to get Adidas on board with the handwritten name branding? Were they game from the jump?

Truthfully, it was just something that we did from the get-go. I had it in my head and in my mind from the very first colorway we made of the purple Grandma’s Couch shoe to have Grandma’s handwriting in cursive under the Adidas logo, because she also one day wrote in cursive, “Unheardof,” and it’s a logo we use from time to time, and we call it the Naomi Handwritten logo.

So when we started first coloring up shoes, I immediately asked her to write out Adidas a bunch of times. We just threw it on the shoe to see what would happen. It flew under the radar at first, but after the first release, there was a lot of push back and forth saying that the Adidas font couldn’t be changed and the logo couldn’t be changed. But there were so many people that loved and were appreciative of the shoe that came out of Grandma’s couch and Grandma’s story and Grandma’s work that it’s now a fan favorite at Adidas.

Outside of Grandma’s Couch fame, was Naomi known for rocking sneakers? What was her footwear game like?

No. My grandma growing up never wore sneakers just like every grandma, especially a grandma who necessarily didn’t have money, but just had a very biblically clean house, wore the same shoes that every grandma wore, just a plain black loafer kind of shoe and an all white pair of sneakers.

Once UnheardOf opened and I really started getting success, for the first year at Christmas, I bought Grandma a pair of sneakers. I bought my mom a pair of sneakers, and I bought my grandpa a pair of sneakers. I always bought them the best top of the line Adidas product and gave it to them on their birthdays and on Christmas, because every year growing up, I never got new shoes at Christmas. I never received any new shoes for any birthday or for any Christmas present.

So when I became the “Shoeman,” I made sure that my loved ones got the best top of the line shoes that we sold in our store. For the last couple of years of Grandma’s life at the assisted living place, she had her own sneaker collection from many different brands, but once we started working with Adidas, she always wore her Adidas, and then she would go to nursing homes, and she would go to doctor’s offices and hospital visits and churches wearing her Grandma’s Couch shoes. And everybody stopped her and asked her about her shoes. And she told them all that she designed them for Adidas and designed them for UnheardOf, and she was very proud of that.

The UnheardOf x Adidas Rivalry Grandma’s Couch 2 retails for $185 and will be available on May 10th exclusively in-store at UnheardOf.