Picture Taken By Maggie
Magda Colon “Maggie”, of Camden New Jersey began collecting sneakers when she was in Highschool and later began to do customs. Maggie has well over 150 pairs of sneakers from The Concord 11’s to the Aqua 8’s. She doesn’t just customize sneakers, she also airbrushes T-Shirts so she pays a lot of attention to detail. The artist loves when customers just give her a theme of what they want and let her do her own thing.
Photo Taken By Cierra Bosarge
Wet Paint Studios is actually a place in Maggies basement where she has a room set up with desks, organized paint and an incredible wall of sneakers. One day she hopes to have her own studio.
How did you get in the Sneaker game?
My collection that I have now is pretty much built off of when I got a job and I was able to pay for all the sneakers that I wanted. So I use to like look at Sneaker Blogs online and follow like, um, like there use to be Sneaker Forums instead of like crazy facebook or whatever. Like you know facebook groups or whatver there was sneaker forums like niketalk.com and it was literally kinda like a reddit but for sneakers specfically. So i use to be on there all the time and thats how I paid attention to what shoes would come out. Like I could see whats coming out but my mom was a single mom raising me by herself so I wasnt getting everything that I wanted but I just always paid attention to the cuture and all of that so once i got my job it was just like… that was it. Everything that I paid attention to when I was growing up now I can do it myself.
Do you remember the first pair of sneakers that you ever got?
So specifically the first pair of Jordans that I remember is the Flint 13’s, its a pair of 13’s that are white, grey with some navy blue. I got two pairs or something like that, they’re right over ther actually, These. They came out in 1998 and my cousin bought them for me for my birthday. That was my first pair of jordans and actually one of my favorite models. So when they released on Novemeber 26th or 24th of 2010 I made sure I got two pairs.
What advice would you give someone that wants to start a Sneaker collection?
Buy what you like! I started with the sneakers before it became a big thing not to say it wasnt always a big thing because it always had its sub culture,but before everyone was doing it. I think the sneaker that set that off was the Concord 11 release in 2011. After that you couldnt see a Jordan sitting on the shelf and people were buying everyhting just to be with the hype. I feel like the biggest thing is buy what you want, not what you think is gonna be hyped. Prime example, litereally one of my boys just had money so he bought everything like every relasse that came out and I would be like why are you buying that? You dont even like the shoe. He would be like”so what blah blah blah.” Thats the biggest thing to me just buy what you want, buy what you like if you wanna be proud of your collection when you look at it and be like yeah, I like everyone single one of these sneakers in here. Honestly that’s biggest thing I can say is buy what you want, to buy what you want your collection to say about you.
Whats your favorite pair in your collection?
I can’t pick one but the Flint 13’s is obviously in my top 5. Aqua 8’s, they’re black turquoise and purple, and Jordan 1’s like just that model itself its so clean it go with everything. So if I had to do a top 3 specifically. I cant just pick a certain one that I love so i would just say Jordan 1’s, Flint 13’s and the Aqua 8’s.
When did you start customizing sneakers?
I started customizing sneakers my Senior year in High school, I read an article on customization and what types of paint to use. A friend of mine wanted to get a pair of sneakers done for his girlfriend and he asked me to do them. I told him in theory I knew how because I read an article but I never did it before. So he was like , “Well do you know where to get the paint?” He gave me the money to buy the paint and was like ” I feel like youre going to do well, I’ll buy the paint for you, just do it.” So, He bought the apint for me and it was over since then.
Can you tell me a story about your favorite customization that you have ever done?
Two of my favorite customs both garnered attention from Sneaker Blogs and I actually got reposted a couple times on them, I actually have one here that I can show you in a second. The one that attracted the most attention both negative and postive was, I actually made a Jordan 4 modelled after NewPort cigarettes. So the laces were brown ,the pods on the side where brown, and the back piece had the striping thats acually on the box so it faded from dark teal to light teal. You can see the representation of a cigarette on them so of course you had the“ oh cancer, blah blah blah! ” Then you know other people just saw the artistic piece of it, like yo you really took all the aspects. You know what it is without physically writing Newport on the shoe. So that one, and the other one is Tiffany 4’s. Diamond Supply, Nicki Diamonds came out with a Nike SB, the Tiffany Dunks super sought after, Its like a metallic silver check on it, beautiful Tiffany blue and black with Croc skin. So I took a Jordan 4, painted the same colors on it and then I hand burned croc skin on the shoe.
Picture taken By Maggie
What are some suppies that every sneakerhead should have?
Sneaker cleaner, I can’t stand dirty laces. What do you use to clean your laces? To clean my laces I use water proofer actually to maintain them from the beggining. You gotta waterproof them first but if they do happen to get dirty then obviously, you gotta clean the whole shoe. As far as sneaker cleaner, I like Crept. Snipez just came out with their own sneaker cleaning line, and we got this thing called a multi-clean bottle and its got the little brush on the top, I dont know what in that solution but like I’m amazed by it, I had to buy it as soon as I tried it.
Tell me the craziest experience you had trying to get Sneakers? And what were the hardest Sneakers to get your hands on?
The craziest experince would have to be the Tiffany Dunks, I did get the Lows but when the Highs release that might have been. Thats actually the only sneaker that I’ve paid over retail for. I dont remember what the retail price was but I think I paid like $160-$170. I had to get up at 4 o’clock in the morning and I dont call it a camp out because we sat in the car. Our pair was locked in I just had to pay more and just sit in the car and make sure we are there. Like it was a legit back door process, we literally went around to the back door of the store, I dont know the name of the store, it was a friend of mine that he had the hook up with that spot.. I think it was somewhere in Willingboro? maybe, I dont even know where we went I just got in the car, Im just sitting there at four in the morning like “Ok, What are we doing?” But I left with the shoes in hand so…
Do you have a strategy for finding Sneakers? Do you have any tips for anyone that wants to get into buying Sneakers?
EBay is actually stepping up as far as sneakers are concered, If im not mistaking ,I dont know if they’re doing it anymore but they were trying to get more poeple to buy EBay. You know Stock X and Goat came on the scene, so they were offering people like $20 0ff if you were buying a pair of sneakers for over $200 or something like that. I’ts harder when you wear Grade school sizes, if you’re looking for older shoes. That was always my problem because Grade school sizes are kid sizes. So when these shoes orginally came out in 2000-2002 if they were being purchased, they were being puorchaed for kids who would trash the shoes. So the chances of me finding a decent pair or even something that is repairable were very slim to none. Thats why if anyone out there has a pair of Cherry 16’s in 6.5, Ill take them, but anyway Ive been looking them for 10 years.
You can find the rest of Maggie’s customs at @Jays_on_deck15 or @wetpaintstudios on Instagram.
Photo Taken by Maggie
On My Sole 