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THE NORTH FACE’s road running shoe returns in a new edition this September, tagged with initials that point to a collaboration nobody can actually confirm.
VECTIV, the sole platform behind THE NORTH FACE‘s current running lineup, takes its name from a blend of “velocity” and “effective,” a fitting label for a technology built to turn a runner’s land into forward drive. The sys debut on the trail on January 26, 2021 with Flight VECTIV, a top-tier ultra-trail shoe develop in Europe and tested across more than 6,000 miles by contract athletes before rel, priced at 28,050 yen at Japan launch. From there the platform expand into VECTIV 3.0 in 2025, spread the same rocker midsole, stable plate and grippy Surface CTRL rubber across trail-specific models like Summit VECTIV Pro 3, Summit VECTIV Sky 2 and VECTIV Enduris 4.
Engineered Garments x The North Face shoe
VECTIV Forward, which launch in Japan this past February through Goldwin’s own online store and select retail, took that trail-test platform onto the road for the first time. Its design borrow direct from the Summit Series trail shoe VECTIV Pro 3, reworked with a wraparound fit for straight-line run, a Pebax and carbon blend plate for propulsion, and a DREAM foam midsole for sustain cushion. It’s a shoe built to translate technical trail engine into something a daily runner would actual reach for on pavement, and it arriv alongside a broader push to stretch VECTIV tech into lifestyle territory too, include the mesh-heavy VECTIV Breeze DCF walking shoe that follow in April.
stir
According to a Japan market release notice, a new VECTIV Forward edition tagged “EG” is schedul to arrive in Japan on September 12. It wouldn’t be the shoe’s first variation since launch. THE NORTH FACE used an atmos Shinjuku pop-up store, running from July 25, to preview a wider refresh of the VECTIV lifestyle side of the lineup: VECTIV Breeze 2 at 23,980 yen, VECTIV Versa LS at 26,400 yen, VECTIV Supple GORE-TEX at 28,600 yen, VECTIV Forward LS at 29,700 yen, and VECTIV Breeze DCF at 33,000 yen. The line has clearly been treated as a platform for repeated colorway and construction updates rather than a single, static release, which makes another edition arriving roughly six weeks later unsurprising on its face.
Specific details on the EG edition itself, including its colorway, price and where it will be sold, were not available in the source material and could not be independently confirmed at time of writing.
about
The “EG” tag invites an obvious reading: Engineered Garments, the Daiki Suzuki label that has built a long, distinctive footwear resume through partners like Alden, Tarvas, Reebok, Converse, Red Wing and Vans’ OTW line. Founded in 1999 under Keizo Shimizu’s Nepenthes umbrella, Engineered Garments has spent decades reworking American workwear, military uniforms and outdoor gear through a Japanese lens, which is exactly the kind of outdoor-adjacent aesthetic that would make a THE NORTH FACE tie-up feel plausible on paper. It’s a reasonable guess, and it’s the one this piece originally set out to confirm.
It didn’t hold up. No press release, retailer listing, Japan market notice or brand social post ties Engineered Garments to VECTIV Forward, or to THE NORTH FACE at all, and Engineered Garments’ own run of footwear partners doesn’t include the outdoor brand anywhere in it. Meanwhile, “EG” has turned up before as a plain style-code suffix on unrelated THE NORTH FACE Japan releases, including a Supreme collaboration sandal with no connection to Engineered Garments whatsoever. Combined with VECTIV Forward’s existing pattern of suffix-based editions, LS being the clearest recent example, the more likely explanation is that “EG” marks an internal variant or colorway code rather than a second brand’s name on the box.
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None of that has been confirmed by THE NORTH FACE or Goldwin either, so it remains an open question rather than a settled one. But absent any actual evidence of a collaboration, treating “EG” as a designer team-up would be reporting a guess as a fact.
where
VECTIV Forward has so far sold through Goldwin’s official online store and a rotating set of North Face and specialty retail partners in Japan, the same channels that carried the LS edition over the summer. Assuming the EG edition follows that same path, it should surface through those outlets close to its September 12 date, with pricing and full details likely to land closer to release.
Footwear has become a deliberate growth focus for THE NORTH FACE’s Japan business specifically, distinct from decisions made at the brand’s global level. Goldwin, which holds the Japan license for THE NORTH FACE and now generates roughly nine in every ten yen of its business from the brand, has been opening dedicated footwear-focused storefronts in cities like Osaka in recent years, treating shoes as their own category rather than an accessory to outerwear. A steady cycle of VECTIV editions, EG included, fits squarely into that strategy, and it mirrors a broader pattern across outdoor footwear right now, where trail-honed plate and cushioning tech keeps getting repackaged for runners who never leave the pavement.
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