Veja and Misci turn Paulistana sneaker into fish-leather summer drop

Veja’s latest Paulistana drop is the kind of sneaker that makes sustainability feel like a fashion proposition instead of a moral lecture. The French label and São Paulo-based Misci turned the retro runner into a fish-leather summer release, using pirarucu on the front or back of the shoe depending on the colorway and pairing it with Nolyn, suede, Amazonian rubber and bio-based EVA.

The collaboration first surfaced on Misci’s runway during Rio Fashion Week in April, then landed in stores as a polished, commercially sharp answer to the current appetite for unusual materials. The shoe comes in almond and walnut, and Veja’s Brazil site lists the almond pair at R$1,500 and the walnut at R$1,350. That price sits firmly in premium sneaker territory, but the materials story is doing the heavy lifting: pirarucu is a large freshwater fish native to the Amazon basin, and its use has become a way to turn what could be food-chain waste into something more valuable for local fisheries and communities.

Misci gives the collaboration its sharper cultural frame. The label was created by Airon Martin in 2018, is based in São Paulo, and builds clothing, accessories and furniture around Brazilian identity, regionality, sustainability and responsible innovation. Martin, who was born in Sinop in Mato Grosso, has also dressed Rosângela Lula da Silva, Oprah Winfrey, Rosalía and Indya Moore, which helps explain why Misci has moved from niche label to name brand without losing its edge.

Veja, meanwhile, supplied the silhouette with recognizable mass appeal. The Paulistana arrived on September 5, 2024 as part of the brand’s retro-running lineup, and Veja describes it as a vintage-running shoe with a contemporary touch. That foundation matters: when a sneaker is already familiar, a material switch reads instantly. Pirarucu leather is not just decorative novelty here. It gives the Paulistana a tactile, slightly unexpected finish that feels more current than another white leather runner, and more legible than sustainability messaging that disappears into the background.

The partnership also fits the broader shift in fashion toward materials that signal ethics through texture. Unusual leather, especially when tied to Brazil and the Amazon, has become one of the clearest ways to make responsible fashion feel fresh again. In Misci and Veja’s hands, the Paulistana does exactly that: it looks like a summer sneaker, but it also carries a sharper argument about where luxury, regional craft and sustainability now overlap.