CONVERSE'S THIRD JACK PURCELL PUSH LANDS WITH PALMES

Converse teased the Jack Purcell's comeback in an Off Court Terrasse campaign back on July 1, three months before Copenhagen tennis label Palmes became the silhouette's first outside collaborator. The Converse x Palmes Jack Purcell PDM releases September 14 on Converse.com in two colorways, and it is the third distinct Jack Purcell story the brand has run since early summer.

June 23. The Reissue Nobody Asked For Got Real.

Converse announced the First String Chuck Taylor Woven Leather's follow up on June 23, confirming a First String Jack Purcell would extend the premium in house tier to a second silhouette. The First String tier began May 5 with a Chuck Taylor Woven Leather at 200 dollars, so Jack Purcell became its second silhouette four months later. The relaunch itself did not land until September 8, in White and Mountain Green, built on a widened last with a Vibram outsole and Nike Air cushioning under premium leather. Converse spent the six weeks between those two dates teasing the relaunch through an Off Court Terrasse lifestyle campaign, treating a 1935 tennis shoe like a headline release instead of a reissue nobody asked for.

Palmes Has Never Made a Shoe Before This One

The Converse x Palmes Jack Purcell PDM marks Palmes' first footwear collaboration with the brand, arriving in two colorways, Parisian Night and Mountain View, built from canvas and suede uppers with contrast stitching and off white laces. Palmes did not touch the First String model that launched six days earlier. It picked the PDM instead, the version carrying a 1970s Script and Wedge plug logo pulled straight from the Converse archive rather than the newer Vibram sole. Both pairs retail for 100 dollars and release September 14 through Converse.com, Palmes and select retailers, well below the 200 dollar First String Chuck Taylor Woven Leather that opened the premium tier in May, positioning the Palmes PDM as the accessible entry point into the relaunch, not its flagship version.

Performance Gear or Nostalgia Were the Only Options

Palmes founder Nikolaj Hansson started the label in Copenhagen in the summer of 2021 after taking up tennis during the pandemic and finding nothing in menswear that fit the sport beyond pure performance gear or pure nostalgia. Five years later that gap is the entire pitch: a Jack Purcell built for a tennis club, not a running track. Palmes has leaned into that identity before through a Tennis Society capsule with Sperry, but never with a heritage sneaker brand the size of Converse. The caption announcing the collection called it a collection for the love of tennis, anywhere, which reads less like a slogan and more like Hansson's own founding complaint answered in canvas and suede.

Parisian Night Meets a 1970s Outsole

Parisian Night leans dark canvas with suede overlays. Mountain View flips the palette lighter, but both pairs keep the Jack Purcell's smile toe cap untouched and carry the same rubber outsole stamped with Converse's 1970s Script and Wedge branding, a detail pulled from the archive, not redrawn for the collaboration. That outsole choice puts the PDM in a different lane than the September 8 First String pair, which used a modern Vibram unit built for durability over nostalgia. Palmes chose the older logo. Converse let them.

Kenzo Moved Faster on Chuck 70 Than It Has Here

Kenzo teased a second Jack Purcell collaboration of its own on July 3, tied to Nigo's Kenzo Spring Summer 2027 show at Paris's Place des Victoires, expanding a partnership that started with an April 2025 Chuck 70. Nigo has led Kenzo's creative direction since 2021, and the Jack Purcell tease would be his second sneaker pairing with Converse. No retail date has followed. Converse now has three separate Jack Purcell threads running at once, a First String reissue, a Palmes tennis capsule and a Kenzo runway tie in, and only two of them have shipped.

A Tennis Shoe Week Converse Did Not Win Alone

Nike released its own tennis inspired shoe the week the First String Jack Purcell launched, the Kallmeyer Centre with Amanda Anisimova fronting the campaign on September 8. Converse is not the only brand treating tennis as the season's reference point, but it is the only one running three separate collaborations off a single 91 year old last. Two Jack Purcell PDMs land September 14 for 100 dollars each. What Kenzo ends up building is still an open question.

Three Jack Purcell stories in eleven weeks is not an accident, it is a bet that a shoe designed for badminton in 1935 has more collaboration room left than the Chuck Taylor does after a century of use. Palmes gets first crack at that room on September 14, at 100 dollars a pair, with an archive outsole nobody asked Converse to bring back.