- Stone Island and New Balance have tapped Bukayo Saka and Endrick to front their Summer 2026 capsule, one of the most anticipated football-fashion crossovers of the year.
- The anchor piece is the New Balance ABZORB 1890 sneaker in two colorways, dropping June 4, 2026, on stoneisland.com and select Stone Island stores, with a wider release to follow via New Balance.
- The full capsule includes a reversible resin-coated ripstop tracksuit, matching jacquard football shirts and shorts, and a Nylon Prismatico-TC hooded jacket, covering both on-pitch and off-pitch looks.
- The collection arrives just in time for the 2026 World Cup, making the campaign timing as strategic as the product itself.
New Balance and Stone Island are back, calling upon stars Bukayo Saka and Endrick to front their latest Summer 2026 capsule. The two players represent the new generation of football talent shaping both sport and style, and their involvement feels deliberate.
Saka has become one of New Balance’s most visible football ambassadors in recent years, regularly appearing in campaigns and wearing the brand’s boots on the pitch.
Beyond New Balance, Saka holds active deals with Burberry and Fiverr, and his image-rights company, BS7 Rights Limited, nearly doubled revenue to £4.64 million in 2024.
The campaign was shot by photographer Bolade Banjo. The new ABZORB 1890 runner features reflective “teardrop” decorations attached through high-frequency welding, borrowing its sole unit from New Balance’s 2002 archive, with a micro ripstop upper, no-sew overlays, and a full-length ABZORB cushioning system.
Stone Island joins a short list of 1890 collaborators that includes Action Bronson, Joe Freshgoods, and JJJJound.
This isn’t New Balance’s first time pairing Saka with young footballers for a campaign splash, as seen when Eberechi Eze, Timothy Weah, and Saka all starred together in a New Balance football campaign. The brand has been deepening its football roster significantly, as when Yunus Musah was named a New Balance football athlete.
The timing is particularly poignant for Saka, Arsenal were just crowned 2025-26 Premier League champions, ending a 22-year wait for the club’s 14th top-flight title.
For Endrick, the moment is equally charged: after racking up eight goal contributions in his first 11 Ligue 1 appearances on loan at Lyon from Real Madrid, the 19-year-old earned a recall to the Brazil squad ahead of this summer’s World Cup. He also holds active deals with Red Bull and Disney.
New Balance and Stone Island are calling their latest collaboration an “off-pitch” affair, a necessary distinction since the drop is a two-parter that also features pro football boots with thermally bonded panels and an engineered jacquard football kit.
Takeaways
This campaign is football fashion doing what it does best right now, using two players at the absolute peak of their cultural moment. Saka just won the Premier League. Endrick just secured a World Cup spot. Stone Island and New Balance didn’t just pick faces; they picked momentum.
The ABZORB 1890 is also cementing itself as one of the most coveted new silhouettes in the sneaker world, and having Stone Island, a brand with deep terrace-culture DNA, co-sign it puts it squarely at the intersection of sport and serious streetwear.
The $250 price point and limited first-wave drop signal this isn’t meant to be everywhere at once, which keeps the heat high heading into World Cup summer.
For both athletes, showing up in a Stone Island campaign alongside a New Balance collab that’s already in JJJJound and Joe Freshgoods company is a credibility stamp that goes beyond just a boots deal.
With Saka and Endrick both heading into the 2026 World Cup, how much does their on-pitch performance this summer amplify or deflate the reach of this campaign? Is the ABZORB 1890 on track to become New Balance’s next iconic silhouette, and does the Stone Island collab seal that legacy?
