Chucks: The Phenomenon of Converse: Chuck Taylor All Stars

by Hal Peterson

Hal Peterson takes an in-depth look at the history, significance, and magic of “Chucks,” as legions of enthusiasts call them.  Though they have a simple, classic style, the 150 color photos make clear that true believers always find ways to individualize their favorite footwear. Peterson explores trends in everything from lace styles to color schemes, and highlights Converse’s newest feature that allows you to “design your own.” He also takes a look at the social importance of Chucks: Chucks in sports, in rock and roll, in movies and art. What is it about this sneaker that makes it so culturally pervasive? With help from Converse-wearers, we’ll find the answers.

Genres: Fashion

160 pages, Hardcover

First published November 1, 2007

Reviews

[James · Rating 1 out of 5]

The story of Chuck Taylor's and their namesake could be fascinating. This is just a series of bad, repetitive pamphlets that neither build on each other nor should have been collected.

Avoid like a pair of Candies.

[Jeanne · Rating 2 out of 5]

The history and trivia were fun and interesting, but the summaries of every movie and television show where a pair of chucks was ever worn were ridiculous.

[Liam · Rating 2 out of 5]

It's a cute sort of miniature coffee-table book, and it does have some interesting historical information about the original company and the role of Chuck Taylor in promoting the brand, but this unfortunately soon devolves into a lot of sketchy, lightweight, not particularly useful cutesy nonsense that gives the impression of being a lame attempt by a clueless middle-aged man to appeal to a readership of pubescent girls. Unless I am very much mistaken (which is always possible), I don't think reading books, cutesy or otherwise, is very high up on the "to-do list" of most pubescent girls nowadays; or boys, either, for that matter. That was already the case, and should have been perfectly obvious to all concerned, even in 2007. This unavoidably begs the question of who the target audience was actually intended to be for this book- grown adults with the mentality of 10 or 12 year old kids, perhaps? I'm not sure. I bought it simply because it looked interesting and was extremely inexpensive, so whatever...

Like I said, it will look cute on a coffee-table next to the Doc Martens book (Dr. Martens Air Wair).

It is disappointing that it isn't even as good as the latter, which wasn't ever intended to be a "real book", but rather just a particularly nice promotional item.

This could have been a really good, extremely interesting book, however, if the author had been willing to do a bit more work...

[Faloni © · Rating 5 out of 5]

🤞💙🎶💥How many of you have a big ass closet full of shoes with three different sizes in it? Lol' mhmm 😛🤣 Chucks! that you can't fit right now that you're hoping you could someday .↕️✏️👣🌏

[La'Tonya Miles · Rating 2 out of 5]

Chucks certainly do warrant an extended an analysis of their impact on American popular culture, but this is not it. The book was good for some minor trivia but overall I found it to be trite and padded.

[Jennifer · Rating 4 out of 5]

How can I not enjoy fun facts and photos about my favorite shoes? I mean.... come on!