Sole Bloc – Scotland’s first sneaker festival.

It had been long overdue, but finally, on the 1st of August 2015, Scotland had it’s first ever sneaker festival – Solebloc, held in Glasgow, and it was an absolute banger. The event itself was held at the excellent SWG3, a warehouse in Glasgow’s West End, and was the best setting for the event.

With months of planning, and many more months of talk about actually doing the event, there was quite a lot of apprehension in the air, but because of the consistently brilliant work from three of the most hard working guys I know – Rob, Al, and Mark, the event was a blinding success.

Even the typical Scottish weather wasn’t going to be able to rain on our parade that weekend.

First events aren’t always expected to be a huge success, but with names like hanon shop, Main Source, Schuh, Ropes Laces, Angelus, Solegrain, Stance Socks, Forty Clothing, Abandon Ship, a number of names, Fat Buddha Store, Transalpino, Manifesto, Lace Jam, 80’s Casuals, Red Bull, and our very own Sneakers ER and NB Gallery, as well as all the private sellers, it truly did seem like Sole Bloc had everything covered.

My absolute undivided attention was given to our NB Gallery Exhibition which was held in the most perfect room on the second floor of SWG3, where we showcased over 250 pairs of New Balance in a unique pyramid style. You can check out some of the highlights below, but jump over the a full run down of NB Gallery @ Sole Bloc here. I must extend a big thanks to all of our friends who helped put on the exhibition, namely Blair Massari, Mark Watson, and Sean Taylor for providing their shoes, as well as Arkadiusz Skolak, and the rest of the guys who put in a good shift of building IKEA units and making copious amounts of NB boxes. It was all greatly appreciated, truly.

Moving on from NB Gallery but not too far away, we had Sneakers ER out in the hallway of the second floor, where Rob himself put in an absolute shift answering any and every question put to him about all your cleaning and restoration needs. He even showed us all how good at multitasking he is, by not only being on hand to answer questions, but also on hand to demonstrate the full capabilities of the Sneakers ER product.

It didn’t end there though, if you were convinced by the product, then all you had to do was head down to the ground floor and grab yourself some of the product which they had for sale in the first room.

Another attraction of the event which really has to get a mention is the sheer generosity from the guys at hanon shop, who held a lottery for three of their favourite collaborations, with all proceeds being donated to CLAN Cancer Support in Aberdeen, Scotland. Over £1700 was raised and donated, a pretty special gesture from the hanon shop team if I do say so myself.

Without sounding like a broken record, the event had a great vibe all day, even when the heavens opened, this didn’t dampen the spirits of everyone at the event. A really awesome day was had, and this wouldn’t have been possible without every single person that attended, so thanks to all the old and new faces who swung through on the day! Thanks to the organisers, the sellers, the DJs, the bar staff, the food vendors, the helpers, every last one of you. You guys are the shit!