Continuing their ongoing lifestyle Super Team 33 releases, NB offerings released at 33 select worldwide retailers, New Balance is set to release the New Balance 998 Super Team 33 Luggage Collection. Designed to mirror the shift from loud and ostentatious sneakers to a more sophisticated high end taste, the New Balance 998 Super Team 33 Luggage Collection features three New Balance 998s that each draw design cues from high end pieces of luggage including high end Italian crafted luggage, vintage traveling trunks, and Swiss Army luggage.
 
According to Jonathan Grondin, Luggage collection designer at New Balance USA, the New Balance 998 Super Team 33 Luggage Collection "was inspired by three separate personalities. Each shoe is representative of the type of luggage each of these three personalities would carry for travel”.
 
 
"The first shoe design is evocative of a person who emits a sophisticated sense of style, hence the use of luxurious materials and brown contrast stitching on the crocodile-embossed high fashion shoe. The materials used show off the changes in the animal skin in both size and depth. The second shoe, inspired by vintage traveling trunks, features glove soft worn leathers. All colors and textures of the materials used represent the many layers of a high-end trunk (i.e. protective corners, the trunk’s wrap, edges, handles). The third shoe, representative of Victorinox Swiss Army luggage, is built to appear high-tech. Using mostly black coloring and ballistic mesh, the shoe features a balance of nubuck and patent leathers to represent the balance of high polish and sandblasted components of the Victorinox luggage.
 
Luggage collection details include elaborate designs on the tongue of each shoe, the sole insert and the outsole. A specialty shoebox, inspired by cigar, chocolate, and jewelry boxes, is velvet-lined to give added sophistication to each pair of ST33 Luggage shoes it contains. "
 
 
The New Balance 998 Super Team 33 Luggage Collection is set to release early March for a retail of $200.
 
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