West's Love, Paranoia And Coconut Shoes

In July 9th, Kanye West became the cover of Forbes. In the latest 100 earnings list, Kanye ranked third in 150 million dollars, and three years ago he claimed 53 million dollars in debt. Forbes came to Kanye's mansion in Losangeles to interview the controversial figure. "Genius" or "madman"? Kanye's extreme life is undergoing a turning point.

Kanye West (Kanye West) is coming. When he drove the matt Lamborghini SUV into his own gate, it's hard for you not to notice this earthquake like posture.

Kanye lived with his wife, Kim Kardashian (Kim Kardashian) and their four children in the mansion in the outskirts of Losangeles. The outdoor view is wide and the scenery is luxuriant, which contrasts sharply with the alabaster wall. The courtyard floor is made of a fragile Belgian plaster. Once the wastage can only be repaired by a professional team from Europe to California. In order to create a private space for his family, Kanye even bought the surrounding houses. "This house is his heart," Kardashian told reporters. "I have never seen such a detail person."

After entering the hall, Kanye's library is on the left hand side. The bookshelves are full of fashion art books such as Alexander McCune: the beauty of the wild and Murakami Takashi: Weird blood. Kanye randomly adjusts their positions to make them more untidy and disorderly. The Butler handed over a pair of shoes. Kanye pointed to the Air Jordan 1 on the feet of his reporter. "I remember the first pair of shoes I painted were these." He sighed, "God has his own arrangements."

Kanye West's sensitivity made him one of the most popular musicians in the world. DJ Khaled said: "Kanye is far more than other artists, is completely another height." Khalid has worked with Kanye for several times in music, and joined Kanye in the 100 highest paid artist list in 2019. However, like Michael Jordan in the 90s, most of Kanye's income comes from sneakers.

In 2009, he launched the Yeezy series with Nike, and brought it to Adidas in 2013. Whether from cultural influence or commercial strength, Yeezy is qualified to list the Jordan empire that has stood for 34 years as a catch up target. The Jordan series has annual sales of about $3 billion, and the annual sales of the Yeezy series are expected to exceed US $1 billion 500 million in 2019.

Just like the floor material of the courtyard and the location of the collection, Kanye concentrating on the details of the shoes. Kanye mentioned that he adored Steve Jobs (Steve Jobs) very much. He also referred to Apple Corp's practice in designing the Yeezy series, and played an infinite color matching in the limited style. In his eyes, Yeezy Boost 350 is the sneaker version of iPod. This dozens of color matching and variants of shoes occupy the bulk of the Yeezy Series sales. Kanye said: "I am very happy to solve problems in life through product design and bring them great joy."

This persistence in detail is sometimes beyond the ordinary understanding. When Forbes shot the cover for Kanye, he insisted on wearing a Black Hoodie. In the second day of shooting, he put on the same hat. On the eve of the release of the album and even the public release, Kanye had revised the title and cover of the album. In 2018, Kanye, the producer of Pusha-T's new album "DAYTONA," decided to change the album cover at 1:00 a.m. on the night before the album's release, and spent $85000 to pay for the album. When Kanye felt that the reporter of Forbes did not correctly understand the influence of religion on his business achievements, he even called the editor himself again to stress this point.

Based on the sales of Yeezy series shoes, Forbes estimated Kanye's pre tax income in the past 12 months to $150 million. But his team insisted that this figure should be even higher. In any case, this is the most brilliant stage of Kanye's career. In this year's 100 celebrity list, Kanye West ranked third, the top two were Tyler Swift and Kelly Jenna.

In 2016, Kanye suddenly publicize $53 million in debt, and then cancelled all the remaining performances of the "Saint Pablo" tour, which was sent to a local hospital in Losangeles for psychiatric treatment. He attributed his experience to religious power, or his extreme attitude towards life - genius on the left and lunatic on the right. Like many entrepreneurs with hyperactivity and Asperger syndrome, Kanye does not regard his mental problems as a hindrance to his career development, but regards it as a superpower to help unlock his imagination. The term "madman" will not be widely used in the future, and people will increasingly realize that this is a state. Some people are born so, some people are forced to choose. Facts have proved that many people who are regarded as crazy have made great achievements. "

Kanye said: "my father took me to see the car show. From that moment, I was infatuated with Lamborghini. Now I have the charm of Lamborghini no matter what I do. Don't you think Yeezy is Lamborghini in the shoe world? " He asked reporters.

In Kanye's music career, he has maintained a rigorous attitude. After dropping out of University, he appeared as a music producer of Jay-Z record company Roc-A-Fella Records and participated in planning the new album "The Blueprint" of Jay-Z in 2001. In February 2004, Kanye released her first studio album, The College Dropout, which won the runner up of the US billboard album with 441 thousand US sales in the first week. Unlike the prevailing mainstream style of rap, Kanye did not mind showing his fragile self in his works. Kanye, a middle-class family and well-educated, is not a "pure breed" in the black rap circle. He broke the stereotype of black rap, and rarely talked about drugs, gangs, and hard work. Instead, he liked to talk about serious issues in a humorous manner.

Kanye's achievements in music gave him the chance to design sneakers. In 2007, he worked with Bape to launch the Bapesta FS-001 "College Dropout", adding a symbolic element "dropout bear" on the side of shoes. This pair of sneakers is now on average at StockX more than 4000 dollars. Based on this, Kanye further established contacts with people in the fashion industry. At that time, Dior Homme and Yves Saint Laurent creative director Eddie Slimane (Hedi Slimane) told Kanye that he believed Kanye could play a role in the field of shoes design. Inspired by Kanye, Mark Parker met Nike CEO Mark Parker in a flight. After some communication, Parke decided to cooperate with Kanye. Kanye recalls: "I showed Parke my sketching manuscript, and he thought I was an interesting guy."

Yeezy was born. As for this name, Kanye explained that this is the abbreviation of the nickname "Kanyeezy" which Jzy-Z gave him. From the cooperation between Adidas and Run-D.M.C. in 80s to Reebok and Jay-Z and 50 Cent, Hip-hop has an inseparable relationship with sports shoes from the day of its birth. And Kanye was the first person to do that at Nike. John Conan, a Cowen analyst at Wall Street investment bank, said: "Kanye's achievements in the design and sales of shoes are absolutely excellent." (JohnKernan)

At the same time, Kanye's family life and career direction are undergoing great changes. In 2007, his mother died in a cosmetic operation. The following year, he broke up with his fiancee Alexis Feiffer (Alexis Phifer). In 2008, in the transformation album "808s&Heartbreak", Kanye, a rapper, played a tune. The 808 drum and Auto Tune elements used widely became the objects of global artists competing to imitate. "808 drum is the voice of heartbreak." The two most important women in life left one after another, and Kanye's mental state became very unstable.

At the 2009 MTV Music Video Awards ceremony, Kanye suddenly jumped onto the stage at Tyler Swift Swift's award-winning speech, grabbed her microphone and claimed that Beyonce's Single Ladies (Put a Ring on It) should be awarded the honor of Taylor. After this stunning episode, Kanye cancelled the tour that he had already finalized with Lady Gaga, and moved to Italy to join the Fendi (Fendi) design team as an intern. After returning from Europe, Kanye began to praise his holiness. In his 2013 album Yeezus, he declared himself to be God.

At the beginning of 2016, Kanye sent frequent articles on twitter, claiming that he needed help from technology rich to solve 53 million of his previous liabilities, and named Zuckerberg Mark Zuckerberg to apply for $1 billion. During the tour in 2016, Kanye rose to a large monologue, and even implied that Jay-Z was trying to assassinate him. Later, Kanye cancelled the psychiatric treatment of the rest of the tour and received his first public appearance after discharge. He went to Trumpt tower to take a group photo with the then candidate Trump. This move has made it difficult for many of Kanye's core audiences to accept.

In the field of sports shoes, Kanye West of that stage is also experiencing setbacks. With the explosion of Air Yeezy II in 2012, Kanye hoped Nike not only regarded him as a celebrity of cross-border cooperation, but Nike insisted on refusing to pay the copyright tax to Kanye, a non athlete. After learning about this contradiction, Adidas executives immediately invited him to visit his headquarters in Germany, and with the help of Scooter Braun, an entertainment agent, signed an unprecedented contract with Kanye in 2013: 15% of copyright revenue plus marketing expenses. In 2013, Adidas executives had invited him to visit the German headquarters. In contrast, Michael Jordan's copyright income from the Air Jordan series is about 5%.

In 2015, Kanye launched Yeezy Season 1. In 2016, he held a press conference in Madison Square Garden for Yeezy Season 3 and the new album "The Life of Pablo", exposing a variety of color matching of Yeezy 350. This combination of Kanye's unique design language and Adidas's home shock mitigation technology Boost has become a hot topic. It not only let the low shoe again play an important role, but also changed people's consumption concept. Although Adidas has never released the sales data of the Yeezy series, Kanye disclosed in 2016 that the series sold 40 thousand pairs in a few minutes after the release.

With the help of wife Kim Kardashian and Kardashian family, Yeezy series shoes and costumes can always be passed to hundreds of millions of social media users at the first time, while Kardashian sisters wearing the Yeezy full set of street scenes is the best advertisement. The couple who were married in 2014 have been working together in business. Whether it's the mobile game "Kim Kardashian: Hollywood" or the recently controversial body sculpting underwear brand KimonoIntimates, Kanye has personally participated in the design of all his wife's commercial projects. Kim Kardashian has ranked twenty-sixth in Forbes's 100 celebrity list. She has been very positive about Kanye's positive influence in the media: "Kanye taught me never to compromise, and to stick to what I really want. Before I knew him, I was very short of thinking. I would not mind if any product wanted to bring my name.

This is a very tight schedule for couples of top traffic in Hollywood. Even if there is no time for conversation during the day, they will exchange their design ideas while watching a crime play before going to bed. Kanye calls this exclusive link a "bedtime crime TV drama conference".

Recalling the act of asking Mark Zuckerberg for help on twitter, Kanye mocked himself, "I heard he was looking for aliens at that time." Kanye was grateful that he could get out of the situation and achieve today's success.

Speaking of aliens, if you really want to understand Kanye's creative process, you must know the planet Tatu of planet Luke's star wars in Star Wars. Inspired by it, Kanye and his team have been trying to design an activity room with simple aesthetic ideas, hoping to serve as a housing unit for low-income people in the future.

At 12 midnight, Kanye drove his Lamborghini to a cottage in the forest. In the room, a small group of four people is making the final adjustment on the computer. In the morning of the second day, they will go to old gold mountain to report to the interested investor. The walls were covered with sketches and notes. Kanye stood close to the design team and watched carefully. He suggested from time to time that they change the font of some place, or increase the brightness of a particular picture. Kardashian once said: "he always encourages people to walk out of comfort zone and challenge their limits. This is very helpful for people to grow. "

More than half an hour later, Kanye was generally satisfied with the reporting plan and left the reporter from the back door. He walked along a muddy path towards the forest and finally came to a clearing. The three spaceships of wooden structural skeletons stand under the night sky, and the shock brought by this huge volume makes the screen become a bit of a fantasy. He described to reporters that these are the embryonic form of team building, which can be used as a living space for tramps and can be buried underground in the actual use.

In the night, he stood speechless for a long time.

After returning from San Francisco, Kanye did not talk with reporters about the follow-up of the plan report. In the parking lot behind the office, he will arrange all shoes and all colouring footwear products designed by Adidas in a circular shape, including YZY BSKTBL, which is banned by NBA because of the reflective elements of shoes. He proudly emphasized: "just like Air Jordan 1 is banned by the alliance because of the bright black and red colors, we are all breaking the rules of the brave."

There are about 1000 pairs of Yeezy footwear products in the field. When the reporter verified the exact number to Kanye, Kanye expressed his dissatisfaction with this practice: "love can not be measured by numbers. If your grandmother carefully prepared a cake for you, your first reaction would be to ask her how much butter she had sprinkled with a few grams of icing sugar. These movements and happiness can not be quantified. "

Kanye claims to be a person who knows nothing about digital transformation, but in fact, his Yeezy is ushering in an inflection point related to numbers. Like Air Jordan, Yeezy has attracted a steady stream of followers through very low volume and surprise sale. NPD retail analyst Matt Powell (Matt Powell) explains: "as Nike has launched various Air Jordan series of shoes in recent years to compensate for the weakness of other products, Air Jordan's image in consumers has declined. The reason why the products that are linked to celebrities are repercussions is because of their scarcity. If they are too easy to get, they will destroy their own business models.

Adidas has realized this. "At present, we are strictly controlling the volume of Yeezy series, and the sales of Yeezy Series in 2019 will not account for a large share in the overall sales growth of the company." Adidas chief executive Kasper Rothd (Kasper R rsted) said: "this is not because of the decline in the brand of Yeezy, but the need to extend the vitality of the Yeezy series through a scientific management system." In other words, Kanye did not want to sacrifice his brand reputation in pursuit of sales. He said Yeezy is developing sustainable shoemaking technology with algae as raw material, which can achieve 100% biodegradation through landfill or spraying specific bacteria.

Kanye still holds one hundred percent shares of Yeezy. It also explains why he became a billionaire earlier than Jordan.

"We have not yet fully developed the potential of this cooperation mode," Kanye West said. "We have just lick the first layer of frosting."