Converse and Purple Things Trade Canvas for Suede and Pearl on the All Star LGCY

A Tokyo streetwear label built by designer Kikuno reworks Converse’s flagship archive model in suede, purple, and lace-strung pearl hardware.

Converse is handing its All Star LGCY profile over to Tokyo label Purple Things for a collaboration built entirely around one color story. The Suede All Star LGCY HI / Purple Things drops the archive-referencing high-top into a single purple colorway, running from the suede upper down through the ankle patch and spare laces. It is a quieter kind of collide than the loud graphic drops that typically define streetwear team-ups: rather than laye on brand, the two labels let the hue and the materials carry the design.

The base shoe already leans vintage. Converse built the All Star LGCY line to fold archive details into a more comfortable, modern fit, and that groundwork shows up here in the suede upper’s worn-in texture and the shoe’s overall silhouette, which reads closer to a decades-old pair pulled from a closet than a fresh retail release. Purple Things’ contribution sits inside that vintage frame rather than fighting it, using its signature color to unify the shoe from toe to ankle.

Purple Suede Converse Chuck 70 High-Tops With Pearl-Embellished Laces

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The shoe’s most distinct detail sits at the laces. Converse and Purple Things added pearl-style hardware designed to thread directly onto the shoelace, a small addition that pulls the sneaker away from straightforward streetwear territory and toward something closer to jewelry. It is an unusual pairing for a shoe built on a vintage suede base, and that contrast is the point: a classic, worn-in silhouette dressed up with a detail more commonly seen on accessories than on footwear.

That tension between classic and refined runs through the rest of the shoe as well. The outsole carries an original logo that shows through the rubber, a subtle branding choice that avoids the loud, oversized graphics common to connection shoe. A spare set of laces, dyed to match the ankle patch, ships in the box, giving the pearl hardware a second life if the included pair wears down. Converse lists the upper as a suede and leather build with a rubber outsole, produced in Indonesia.

It is worth noting how little the shoe leans on obvious co-branding to signal the collaboration. There is no Purple Things wordmark stamped across the toe box, no oversized tag hanging from the laces. Instead, the partner reads through material choices: the specific shade of purple, the suede’s texture, and the pearl hardware sit where a standard eyelet or aglet would normally go. For a label built around a designer’s personal taste rather than a licensed graphic library, that restraint tracks with how Purple Things has approached past collaborations, favoring color and cut over logo placement.

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Purple Things is the work of Tokyo-born designer Kikuno, who launched the label in 2015 as a unisex line before relaunching it as a men’s streetwear brand for spring/summer 2018. Kikuno studied photography before spending four years living in San Francisco and London, and she has described building the brand around the intersection of music, skate culture, and Tokyo street style, drawing specifically from hip-hop and skateboarding as reference points filtered through her own perspective as a female designer working in menswear. The label has previously worked on projects with United Arrows & Sons, and Kikuno has written fashion columns alongside running the brand.

That background lines up with where Converse has taken the All Star LGCY line more broadly: a platform for convincers who want to work within a heritage silhouette rather than override it. Purple Things’ approach here, restrained in graphics but specific in its color and hardware choices, fits that mold closely.

Kikuno has built Purple Things on a specific kind of local credibility rather than scale, work from Tokyo’s Shibuya ward and staying connected to the city’s music and skate scenes through her own network rather than through wide licensing deals. That position explains why a Converse convention  reads as a natural extension rather than a stretch: both brands are working from a shared vocab of vintage-leaning form  and street culture reference points, just approaching it from different scales of operation.

Purple Suede Converse Chuck 70 High-Tops With Pearl-Embellished Laces

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All Star LGCY sits apart from Converse’s standard All Star line as a flagship model built specifically around archive references, aiming for a sil that nods to the brand’s history while updating comfort underfoot. It has become a recurring canvas for connection work at Converse’s Japan business, sitting alongside limited runs, in-house colorways, and outside partnerships across the wider All Star family. The Purple Things pairing continues that pattern, treating the LGCY shape as a base for a collaborator’s own material and color story rather than a platform for a redesigned outsole or added technology.

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The Suede All Star LGCY HI / Purple Things releases August 25, 2026 through Converse stores and the Converse Japan online shop, priced at ¥20,900 tax included under style number 31318420. It arrives in the single purple colorway described above, with sizing running from 22.0cm through 30.0cm in unisex fit. As a lifestyle release built for retail rather than performance, it sits inside Converse Japan’s broader collaboration calendar for the back half of the year, alongside the brand’s ongoing rotation of in-house and outside-partner colorways across the wider All Star family. For a shoe pitched on materials and detail rather than a headline graphic, the release window gives it room to stand on the strength of its suede and hardware alone.