The NikeSKIMS Rift Satin Arrives in University Red, and the Split Toe Came From Kenyan Runners

NikeSKIMS puts its autumn collection on sale globally on October 22, and the color Nike has chosen to carry the season is University Red. It runs across the apparel franchises, across the accessories and across the footwear, which is where it gets interesting. The shoe wearing it is the NikeSKIMS Rift Satin, and the silhouette underneath the satin has a stranger and far better documented origin than anything else in the collection around it.

The Nike Air Rift arrived in 1996, and Nike’s own Inside the Vault feature is unusually direct about where it came from. The shoe was developed with input from barefoot long-distance runners in Kenya and took its name from the Great Rift Valley, with the split toe meant to echo the fault line and create articulation between the first and second toes so the foot could move closer to the way it moves unshod. Nike calls it the brand’s first venture into natural motion footwear, and calls the split toe a first for Nike footwear. Both of those are the company’s own words rather than a retelling, which is what separates the Rift from most of the barefoot running lore attached to mid-nineties product. What Nike has never published anywhere findable is a designer credit, so any account naming a person is going past the source. The Rift 2 followed in 2002 as a cleaner and less bulky version with the split intact, and Nike’s own accounts of when the original first came back do not agree with each other, so the retro timeline is worth leaving alone.

The Rift Satin is a NikeSKIMS build rather than a straight retro, and the University Red pair is monochrome from the strap down through the outsole. Satin wraps the upper and catches the light along the ridge over the toe, and a matte panel sits under the midfoot strap where the material changes texture instead of color. That strap is the closure, hook and loop across the midfoot, with a Swoosh and the SKIMS wordmark debossed into it in the same red. The split runs through the toe and carries all the way through the sole unit, so the two halves of the forefoot are separated above and below. Seen from directly above, the split starts well back from the toe tip, which is what gives the front of the shoe a divided outline rather than a notch cut into it. Underneath, the tread is a field of small raised nubs across the entire footprint rather than a running outsole pattern. The midsole is low and sits close to the ground, which is the part that still answers to the original brief. The pair ships in a satin drawstring bag inside a taupe box, both carrying the Swoosh and SKIMS lockup. Shadow Brown is the companion colorway, releasing the same day at the same price.

Kim Kardashian framed the Rift as a ballet flat when NikeSKIMS introduced its first footwear in January, saying the reimagining felt perfect because of what a ballet flat is. That framing is not wrong about where this version lands, and it is a long way from the brief the shoe was built on. A running shoe developed with Kenyan distance runners has become a satin mule. The honest thing to say is that the Rift had been drifting that way for years without any help from SKIMS. Nike revived it as a lifestyle shoe, the tabi comparison followed it everywhere it went, and the split toe reads as fashion now whatever it was for in 1996. Nike’s own campaign frames for the red pair show it worn with nothing else in shot, cropped at the calf against a plain wall, which is a styling choice that treats the Rift as a flat rather than as a trainer. What this season adds is a color rather than an argument. The headline product is outerwear, the first NikeSKIMS has made, built in a Sherpa franchise and a water-repellent Crunchy Nylon franchise, and the footwear is carried along in the season’s palette rather than leading it.

Nike has both colorways at $160. The Rift 2 sat at $125 when it came back in June, so the satin build and the NikeSKIMS name are worth thirty-five dollars over Nike’s own version of the sequel. Inside Nike’s women’s line it sits above a limited run like the First Sight Shadow at $145 and well above what the Sportswear women’s shelf asks for most low profile shoes. Satin is not a cheap upper to finish consistently and a two piece toe costs more to assemble than a one piece toe, so the number is not hard to account for.

The NikeSKIMS Rift Satin releases globally on October 22 in University Red, style code IQ7158-601, and in Shadow Brown, style code IQ7158-201. Retail is $160 in both, in women’s sizing. It goes up at nike.com/NikeSKIMS and SKIMS.com/NikeSKIMS, with select Nike stores, SKIMS stores and partner retail locations to follow.

Written by

The Sneakers Team

The Sneakers Team is the editorial desk behind becausesneakers, founded and edited by Nick Engvall. Nick has spent more than two decades in the sneaker industry. He built the original Eastbay Blog, led the first dedicated sneaker team at Complex, ran the first UGC and seeding programs at Finish Line, was employee number nine at StockX, and served as Senior Director at Stadium Goods. He hosts the Sneaker History podcast, and his first book, Small Luxuries: Sneakers, arrives in October 2026 from Motorbooks. Release details on this site are checked against the brand's own product information before publication, and anything we cannot confirm is labelled rather than stated.

More from The Sneakers Team →