Wales Bonner’s Hand-Woven Sandal Is the Wildest adidas Yet
The Karintha is the Wales Bonner x adidas sneaker. Not because it’s the shoe everyone associates with the longstanding collaboration — that’d be the Samba, a model Wales Bonner almost single-handedly popularized — but because it’s the shoe that Grace Wales Bonner designed herself.
Up until now, though, the Karintha has just looked like an adidas shoe. It’s been made distinct for its wavy thin sole and Wales Bonner’s signature high-texture fabrics, but it’s always recognizable for its sportswear influences.
The Spring/Summer 2026 Karintha, however, is unrecognizable.
The all-new Karintha isn’t a three-striped sneaker but more of a sandal informed by leather hand-woven in Brazil. But the wavy and sporty sneaker sole remains, creating a point of contemporary contrast against the handmade upper.
That tension has always permeated throughout Wales Bonner’s excellent adidas sneakers, where rustic handstitched details and crochet stripes jar against mass-market adidas sneaker classics. And you see more of that across the SS26 selection that releases on April 27, from Wales Bonner’s pony hair Gazelles to Adios runners with a handwoven tongue.
But the clash between contemporary adidas sneaker and old-fangled handwrought embellishments peaks on the woven Karintha. Which is to say, the most Wales Bonner sneaker of them all got the most Wales Bonner treatment.
Highsnobiety has affiliate marketing partnerships, which means we may receive a commission from your purchase. Want to shop the products our editors actually love? Visit HS Shopping for recs on all things fashion, footwear, and beauty.
