Monday, November 16, 2009

Monday Morning Playlist: Angel Cabada


They’re hundreds of men’s footwear companies on the market these days, all of which seem to be attempting to carve out their niche in the action sport skate market scene. As an unfortunate result we are met with a cluttered, over saturated façade of skate inspired footwear. However, If you sift through the junk you can find a handful of brands that have the footwear game on lock, pushing the boundaries of what we have come to expect from a shoe. Of these elite few, no one does it with the style, consistency, originality and precision of Supra Footwear.

Supra Footwear didn’t come to fruition over night. In fact you could probably trace the brands roots back to a little company by the name of TSA. TSA - Team Santa Ana - was founded in 1991 by a young Angel Cabada, whom at 17 took his love for skateboarding and skate fashion to the next level utilizing the brand as a creative outlet to foster his first two passions. After a successful run of 10 years Angel left TSA and parted ways with his partner. Luckily for us, Angel remained passionate about his pursuit to conquer the skate clothing and apparel market. From there Angel started KR3W, which eventually led to the development of One Distribution. Over the course of the next few years KR3W grew leaps and bounds and with this growth it seemed like a natural move for Angel and company to enter into the skate footwear market. In 2005, after careful consideration, Angel decided launch a second entity placed under the One Distribution umbrella. This second venture would go by the name of Supra Footwear – Latin for “Above and Beyond”.

Since its inception, Supra has grown to be one of the leaders in practical and fashion forward skate footwear. The brand is responsible for taking the sneaker game to the next level mixing traditional skate materials with a blinding array of buckles, chains, and gold embellishments reinventing the conventional silhouette. When Angel agreed to take the time to put together a little Monday Morning Playlist I was stoked to say the least. I have long admired the California native’s entrepreneurial resilience that has advocated a new breed of original footwear design. Through the success of the brand Angel has somehow managed to remain inconspicuous and fly under the radar, which has sparked my curiosity even more.

Enjoy.



You can download this weeks Monday Morning Playlist here. Thanks for the time Angel, much appreciated. If you are in Los Angeles check out Chad and Angel's store Factory 413 or head over to One Distribution. And you might just be luck enough to attend a stop on the Skytop II World Tour which touches down in New York, Chicago, Paris and Boston amongst others.