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Don’t expect New York mag’s Curbed vertical to get seeded Nikecraft GPS sneakers anytime soon, if ever. In a detailed feature, the publication details how over a dozens former employees of renowned contemporary artist Tom Sachs say that he fostered a hostile and toxic work environment in his New York City studio.
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Sneakersheads are familiar with Sachs thanks to his collaborating with Nike for a decade, beginning with his highly coveted NikeCraft Mars Yard 1.0 kicks and most recently the GPS (General Purpose Sneaker) model. Although intended to be readily available, each of the initial three colorways sold out shortly after release and remain immensely popular, However, Sachs isn’t too popular with his former employees, who have accused him of various workplace shenanigans including sexual harassment, bullying and violence.
According to Curbed’s reporting, the employees likened working for Sachs to being in a cult, and he himself described it as such. Also, he allegedly discussed porn openly with his staff.
Per Curbed:
There was vintage porn on the walls of the studio, and Sachs talked at group lunches about the types of porn he was into, including VR. The studio says pornography was mentioned only in the context of projects. “It was always supposed to be ‘for a project,’” says the third former studio assistant. “But what project, I never saw.” Sachs brought up sex and bodies a lot. “He talked to me about women all the time,” says the former studio manager. When he found out about one administrative employee’s living situation, he asked if she was “fucking all of [her] roommates”; another time, he told her she was “lucky to live in a day and age when curves and butts are in fashion.”
Also, the alleged misogyny was in the red in Sachs’ world.
Sachs had a “type,” which he spoke openly about in the office. The administrative employee remembers Sachs bringing his toddler to the studio: “He pointed to me and was like, ‘See, this is what we call a “shiksa goddess.” This is what we call Daddy’s type.’ He said that kind of shit all the time.” (Sachs’s studio says this was a joke.) Another young female studio member says she was afraid to be alone in the studio at night with him. He called a storage room in the basement the “rape room”; in 2016, he changed it to the “consent room.” (Sachs’s studio says this was also a joke.) And while Sachs sometimes required his employees to wear uniforms, he himself was often in formfitting underwear in the studio, according to seven former members. He once even showed up to a Zoom call with female Nike employees in his underwear, according to the administrative employee, who was on the call.
Sachs and his reps are vehemently denying all the accusations in Curbed’s story—and maintain that some of the eyebrow-raising accusations were mere “jokes.” Other accusations include the hurling of objects, uncouth comments and generally abusive behavior by Sachs.
Most of those interviewed did so anonymously due to fear of retaliation in the small fraternity of the art world.
Nike has yet to comment on the story.
