Kanye claims that Adidas created ‘Yeezy Day’ without his permission

Kanye West has accused Adidas of creating "Yeezy Day" — an annual day where the sportswear brand will "re-release" iconic sneakers from the Yeezy archive — without his permission.

On the fourth annual Yeezy Day, which took place yesterday, August 2, a number of limited edition Yeezy trainers were released on the Adidas website to expecting fans, resulting in an app crash as thousands flocked to the site to purchase Ye’s branded shoes.

Complex reported that the rapper had sent them a direct message on the day, accusing Adidas of running the annual event without his permission.

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He added that the company also picked colourways, named them, and hired employees who originally worked for Kanye, all without his approval.

“Adidas made up the Yeezy Day idea without my approval and then went and brought back older styles without my approval,” he said in the message.

He went on to claim: “[Adidas] stole my colorways without my approval stole my styles and material approaches without my approval took talent on the production side and sprinkled them through Adidas Originals without my approval."

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Back in June, Kanye insisted that Adidas had stolen his designs on the release of their Adidas Adilette, a slider that looked familiar to Kanye’s Yeezy Slides.

“When I originally ordered Adidas to make more Yeezy Slides the GM lied to my face and said they didn’t have the capacity meanwhile Adidas was copying my slides,” he told Complex. “Yeezy is 68% of Adidas on line sales.”

Although this looks like the end of Adidas x Yeezy collaborations, Ye’s successful brand has been estimated to have turned over more than $1 billion in the past year while the rapper sees around 5% of that.

[Via Complex]

Gemma Ross is Mixmag's Editorial Assistant, follow her on Twitter