Vans and EVISEN turn the Old Skool into a sushi-inspired skate shoe

Vans and EVISEN Skateboards pushed their two-shoe capsule online on June 13 at 12:00 p.m., led by the Skate Old Skool 36+ in Evisen Ruby Wine for ¥15,400, tax included. The release landed through EVISEN’s official online store, with a Skate Half Cab companion shoe built around a kabuto, or armor, theme.

The Old Skool is the one doing the heavy lifting here, and it works because the joke never swallows the shoe whole. Red leather and suede do the tuna thing, the white Jazz Stripe reads like a clean seam of rice, and the green accents bring in the seaweed cue without turning the pair into a costume. The tongue, heel, and insole carry the same green flash, and the special box art keeps the food reference alive all the way to the unboxing.

That balance matters, because Vans is leaning on a silhouette with real mileage. The Old Skool debuted in 1977 as Style 36, was the first Vans skate shoe to use leather panels for added durability, and started life with the brand’s now-famous side stripe, originally called the jazz stripe. This collaboration sits on that history instead of fighting it.

The Skate Old Skool 36+ also gives the sneaker a modern skate backbone. Shorter toe caps, a thicker tongue, and pull tabs update the fit, while DuraCap underlays, SickStick rubber outsoles, and PopCush insoles keep it in actual skating territory. That is the difference between a clever graphic idea and a shoe that still belongs at the park: this one has the hardware to back up the gag.

EVISEN has been running the tuna-sushi motif for years, so the concept does not feel like a random food pun slapped onto a best-selling Vans model. It feels like a visual language the Tokyo label has already been speaking, just translated onto one of Vans’ most dependable skate shapes. Highsnobiety has framed the Old Skool as a canvas for that kind of referential remixing, and this pair proves the point cleanly: the sushi styling gets the attention, but the skate DNA is what makes it stick.