Herbby Jean-Jacques, sneaker and story collector
Audio 03:52
Herbby Jean-Jacques created the first basketball party in 2017 in Noisiel (France).
© Herbby Jean-Jacques
By: Solène Leroux
10 mins
Herbby Jean-Jacques, 32, piles up the sneakers.
Unlike addict sneakers who don't hesitate to spend huge sums of money to get the latest news, this avid collector prefers when there's a story behind every pair.
Encounter.
Publicity
A few minutes from the RER station of Noisiel (Seine-et-Marne), a small wooded park surrounded by buildings calls for a break. Herbby Jean-Jacques grew up here, he spent his childhood playing on the basketball court at Ferme du Buisson, which sits in the middle of the green space. "
I played football and basketball there, but above all I did my first
blocks there
in 2017 and 2019.
"
A
block party
is an outdoor neighborhood party, around a unifying theme. The ex-Noisiélien organized them around his passions: basketball, sneakers, hip-hop, and more generally art. “
I was born in Basse-Terre in Guadeloupe. Since kindergarten I was in Noisiel: I really wanted to do something in the city where I grew up.
It is here that, at a very young age, he developed his passion for sneakers. “
It happened in 1997 when the animated film
Space Jam
came out.
"Initially rather interested in football,"
by discovering Michael Jordan, basketball and the whole universe around it: I clearly took a slap. Watching the basketball games, I started to focus on the pairs that the players were wearing
”.
In nearly twenty-five years, Herbby has had time to amass a number of pairs. Gifts first, when he was younger. Then in high school, as soon as he was able to work, he enriched his collection. How many sneakers does he have? “
It's not something that I communicate because for me, what is important is the qualitative aspect and not the quantitative aspect.
He laughs. “
Some people may consider that we are a little crazy to buy pairs all the time, to invest a lot in this type of object. Personally, I collect sneakers based on their history. If there was only one pair of sneakers with a story for example, I would have only one.
"
This is what sets Herbby apart from the simple collector: he gives meaning to each pair.
The exact number remains unknown, but the thirty-something gives an order of magnitude: during one of his exhibitions, he presented 150, and that was only part of it.
The importance of the box
“The ones
I have on my feet are the Air Max 1 By You“ Culture and Diversity ”. This is a pair that I co-created last year with Nike's personalization department. I was inspired by the traditional fabric of the Antilles. The pair are red, yellow and green. The color yellow is a nod to the Olympic Games in Paris 2024.
”On the ground where he grew up, Herbby took turns out of pairs: each one is a piece of life. From his first sneakers in 1999, found on the Internet not long ago, to those that Tinker Hatfield, founder of Nike's Air Max 1, signed for him.
However, according to him, it is not only basketball that counts. “
Often I find that the boxes are neglected, whereas in the end, I consider that we pay the pair as much as the box. And that it is a beautiful collector's item that can be personalized.
This is exactly what he did with the box of his own creation. It is rich in information: banana leaves to recall Guadeloupe, a frieze of the cities that marked his life, the colors of his pair ... But also quotes, such as "
the suburbs influence Paname, Paname influences the world
", inspired of "Grand Paris", the sound of Medina.
If he is proud of his collection, he wants to protect it, “
even if it is a collection that I share through my events. I find that with the development of social networks, we show a bit of everything, all the time. While I consider that we must keep a certain privacy. A passion is like a part of everyone in the end. Especially when you live it to the degree to which I live it
”.
The young man has indeed made his passions his job, they are omnipresent through his activities as a consultant, organizer and event speaker and content creator.
“
What will keep you alive is passion and not money.
Or nothing else that has no real human value.
Herbby Jean-Jacques is currently working on future exhibitions, to be found soon in Paris.
Newsletter
Receive all international news directly in your mailbox
I subscribe
Follow all the international news by downloading the RFI application
google-play-badge_FR
Economy
consumption
Fashion
France
On the same subject
Maintenance
Basketball, "a shoe that can unite everyone"
How basketball became a golden market
Young Chinese, good in their sneakers!
How basketball became a golden market
In California, second-hand sneakers are the subject of much speculation