Key Points
- Seven national federations are each paired with a fashion designer, releasing from June 11.
- Collaborators include Jacquemus, Palace, NOCTA, PEACEMINUSONE, Patta, and the Virgil Abloh Archive.
- Each capsule centers a "Cryoshot" sneaker built on a vintage Nike football boot.
- Sneakers are priced at $200, with a wider SNKRS release on June 16.
Nike has revealed the full "X2" World Cup collection, pairing seven national football federations with seven fashion labels ahead of the 2026 tournament. It is Nike treating the World Cup as a fashion event, not just a sporting one — every federation gets a streetwear or luxury house attached to it, each with its own following.
Seven nations, seven designers
The pairings: Canada with Drake's NOCTA, England with Palace, France with Jacquemus, the Netherlands with Patta, Nigeria with the artist Slawn, South Korea with G-Dragon's PEACEMINUSONE, and the United States with the Virgil Abloh Archive. Each designer built a capsule around its national team, and the project also funds local youth sport organizations in each country — the part of the program Nike is leaning on to keep the drop from reading as pure commerce.
The footwear is where the concept gets literal. Several of the Cryoshot pairs ship with icy, semi-transparent outsoles that expose studded football tooling underneath, a nod to the boots they are built from. The result is a sneaker that looks like a lifestyle shoe from above and a cleat from below — wearable off the pitch, but unmistakably rooted in the game.
The "Cryoshot" sneaker
Every capsule centers on a "Cryoshot" sneaker built on a vintage Nike football boot. The Virgil Abloh Archive pair revives Abloh's "The Ten" design language with "AIR" heel branding; Patta reworked the silver paneling of Ronaldo's R9 Mercurial Vapor; NOCTA dressed a 1994 Tiempo in golden yellow; and Slawn covered a 1976 Striker boot in his spray-paint style. The sneakers retail for $200.
How it rolls out
The collection releases in waves: collaborator and federation channels on June 11, Dover Street Market on June 13, and a wider SNKRS and Nike-partner release on June 16. This is the full reveal of the project Nike teased earlier with the Virgil Abloh Archive and Travis Scott on the USMNT side. With the World Cup landing on home soil for the US this summer, Nike is treating the federation jersey the way it once treated the Air Jordan — as a canvas other designers pay to touch.
Source: Highsnobiety, Sneaker Bar Detroit
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