It starts with Kim Kardashian and Skims. In 2019, after fifteen-odd years of shapewear that never quite fit right, she launched a brand with operators Jens Grede and Emma Grede – built around one idea: fit, the female form, and body-conscious design deserved more attention than they were getting. It didn’t launch as Skims, though. It launched as Kimono Intimates, and the internet, followed swiftly by the Mayor of Kyoto, made it very clear that name wasn’t sticking around. Weeks later: Skims. The brand had to earn its own name before it earned anything else, which, looking back, might be the most on-brand thing that’s ever happened to it.
What Skims earned instead of a smooth launch was a cultural conversation that reached far beyond shapewear. Sizes XXS to 5XL. Nine shades of nude. Campaigns that put everyday bodies next to supermodels instead of hiding them behind them. “Inclusive” is a word every brand slaps on a lookbook these days – Skims just kept designing like it meant it, drop after drop.
Then came basketball. Skims became the official underwear partner of the NBA, the WNBA, and USA Basketball, landing the brand squarely at the intersection of sport, fashion, and culture – commissioner Adam Silver has even admitted to wearing it himself. When a shapewear brand shares a locker room with the NBA Finals, you’re not looking at a fashion label anymore. You’re looking at a cultural fixture.
And now comes Nike. Two very different worlds, one new brand: Nike’s performance expertise meets Skims’ approach to fit, style, and the female body. NikeSKIMS isn’t a capsule or a co-branded hoodie – it’s a standalone label with its own leadership, its own studios in Beaverton and LA, and its own roadmap, built quietly for over a year before anyone outside either company knew it existed. Its first sneaker, the NikeSKIMS Rift, took the classic split-toe Air Rift and turned it into something the sneaker world has not stopped talking about since it dropped.
Where this goes next is the interesting part. Two brands that were each already reshaping their own categories are now building one together – and if the debut collections are any indication, they’re only getting started. NikeSKIMS FA26 has landed at BSTN. Go see what two very different worlds look like when they actually work as one.
