Puma will release the next shoe in its Rihanna collaboration, the Creeper Phatty sneaker, on Nov. 30, according to a Monday press release.
The shoe, created in collaboration with musician and Fenty designer Rihanna as part of an ongoing partnership, is a reimagined and redesigned version of her 2015 suede platform Creeper. That style, which frequently sold out minutes after release, was referred to as a must-have shoe at the time.
“The original Creeper changed the game for us,” Maria Valdes, chief product officer at Puma, said in the release. “We knew it was time to bring it back. This shoe has universal appeal and we've seen tremendous consumer excitement for the silhouette to return. We are excited to not only be able to build upon the existing silhouette with the Creeper Phatty but also expand our offering to the entire family.”
The updated version, which the press release called “extreme with an oversized design,” features the style’s signature stacked gum sole, a padded and debossed formstrip, debossed Fenty logo on the tongue and laces with gold aglets. It’s available in black and white, bright blue and green, and lavender and cherry red colorways, with unisex sizing for adults and children. While the release did not disclose a price point, the original version sold for $140.
"We took our OG Creeper and made it bigger and badder," Rihanna, who is currently creative director of the new Fenty x Puma venture, said in the release. "When designing the Creeper Phatty we wanted to reinvent the OG Creeper that was loved by so many. It's a classic silhouette that has been missed, so [its] return had to be bigger."
In March, Puma announced that Rihanna would be returning to collaborate with the brand, and the details of the partnership were revealed in September when the brand dropped its Avanti shoe.
Rihanna’s original deal with Puma lasted four years and ended in 2018, and it helped push Puma to almost $1 billion in sales during the first year of the collaboration. During that time, the creative team released several styles including the now-collectible original Fenty by Puma Creeper, the Fenty x Puma fur slide and the Fenty x Puma bow sneaker. The pairing also resulted in four fashion shows with presentations in New York and Paris.
After ending her relationship with the brand, Rihanna launched and later ended a fashion line with LVMH and stepped away from her role as CEO of lingerie brand Savage X Fenty, which she launched in 2018.
In its Q3 earnings, announced last month, Puma saw an adjusted sales increase of 6% to 2.3 billion euros, or about $2.4 billion at current exchange rates. Its sales in the Americas increased 2.5%, despite a decline in North America, and at the time Puma attributed the decline to “macroeconomic headwinds and PUMA’s relative dependency on the off-price Wholesale business.” Given its popularity in the region, the relaunched Fenty x Puma project may help boost Puma’s bottom line there.
