Among streetwear insiders, which label wins on looks alone — and how much does the name move it?
Teddy Santis's elevated, nostalgia-tinged take on American sportswear — collegiate and heritage cues, refined tailoring, and a long-running New Balance partnership.
Ronnie Fieg's label and multi-brand retailer that grew from a footwear boutique into a streetwear powerhouse, known for high-frequency, high-profile collaborations.
Thirty streetwear personas, each carrying stable taste and memory across all four pairs. The panel is weighted toward people inside the streetwear conversation, with edge and outside cohorts as controls.
No abstract scoring dials — each persona makes a forced choice on every pair, blind, then again once the brand is revealed. We measure the pick, the brand-reveal flip, and the final tally.
How they scored
For a brand, the question isn't “which looks better” — it's how much of the preference is the design versus the name. This study separates the two: a blind pick, then a brand-revealed pick on the identical images.
Aimé Leon Dore wins on looks and the logo amplifies it; Kith holds one axis on design alone. That tells a brand team where equity actually lives — and where a logo is carrying weight the product isn't.