Brand Focus: Village PM

How Village PM asked a better question and built the most interesting shoe of 2025.

“SKATEBOARDING DESERVES PROGRESSIVE FOOTWEAR.”

That belief drove Village PM, the Paris-based skate brand founded in 2024, to create what might be one of the most interesting shoes of last year. Not just in skateboarding. In any category.

This is a product-led company. Not just a flashy disruptor brand.

For the past two decades, skate shoes have been like your favourite Thailand tourist t-shirt, “same same but different”. Different colourways, slightly updated versions of old models and usually looking towards basketball or the 90s for inspiration.

Village PM did something different. They asked a better question. What the shoe should be, not what it used to be.

Founded by lifelong skaters Basile Lapray and Bram De Cleen, both with experience inside technical outdoor brands like Salomon and Arc’teryx, the starting point wasn’t aesthetic. It was functional.

Instead of looking inward to skate history, they looked sideways to rock climbing. A world obsessed with friction, feeling and precision. When it’s put like that, it’s kinda obvious, huh.

That thinking shows up in the details. Extended lacing for better lockdown. Climbing rubber for maximum grip. A shape that feels engineered rather than styled.

Not decorative difference. Functional difference.

‘Don’t look inside your industry for inspiration’ is a rule I think creatives should live by. The most interesting ideas rarely live in the same industry. And I think Village PM are the perfect example of why this is so true. This different thinking and rock climbing mindset, is why I am now writing about a shoe, I haven’t even seen in person.

It also matters that they built this as a proper skate brand, complete with their own all-European skate team.
Culture first. Marketing second.

Because if you’re going to innovate inside a category, you have to respect it.

Here is their debut skate video from 2025.

As always, thanks for reading.

Hayden

Links:
Shop Village PM here.
Follow on IG here.