Sole Searching: Style Architect June Ambrose On Thinking ‘Tall’ While Wearing Sneakers As A Petite Woman

By D'Shonda Brown ·Updated September 1, 2023

‘Sole Searching’ is a series that highlights Black women in the sneaker community, how their passion for footwear began, their thoughts on Black women in sneaker culture, and how they’re leaving their legacy in the sneaker world.

25 years in the fashion andtarget="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">custom Gucci gown at the annual Fresh Air Fund gala to sitting front row during PUMA, where she also launched her debut “High Court” collection inspired by basketball and Ambrose reminisced with ESSENCE about this full circle position within PUMA’s latest Women’s Hoops category. “If you look at the ‘I Can’t Stand the Rain’ video, Missy’s on the hill in the green custom leather jogging suit that I designed for her in a pair of PUMAs. It was because it was retro and it was nostalgic. You talk about a company celebrating its 75th anniversary come next year [and] 50th year of hip hop. There’s definitely no doubt that there are some classic moments and relationships they’ve had with hip-hop culture along the way. It’s nice to come full circle and just be reminded.”

In this installation of ‘Sole Searching,’ ESSENCE caught up with living icon On The Run Tour for two seasons with Jay’s 12 changes and it being the foundation to all of his looks – classic, but impactful moments rooted in performance andtarget="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">tracksuit was a moment.”

On how her daughter Summer Hope challenges her creativity:

“When you can have a cross-generational conversation, there’s something that’s like when you’re sharing clothes or you’re tapping into something that had become taboo. It was the fact that there’s a commonality between someone that’s twice your age that you can relate to each other in particular styles is clever. I love the whole tomboy thing. Obviously, I can’t wear the crop tops like she does, but I get really flattered when she wants to wear something that I own. I try to stay in a space that speaks to both our personalities in a sense, too. We don’t feel the need to be overtly sexy in fitted things to feel beautiful, sexy, and provocative. That’s a great way to communicate how one feels, how I influence her, and how she influences me.”

“It’s not taboo to be in your mom’s clothes, or for me to be wearing anything she’s wearing. I love her style expression because she doesn’t try so hard. She doesn’t feel the need to chase a label. It’s so much more about what she has to say, opposed to how she looks. At first, I was like, ‘oh my God, she’s not a fashion girl.’ Then, I appreciated the fact that she wasn’t caught up in the name, but more so caught up in how she interprets it.”

Sole Searching: Style Architect June Ambrose On Thinking ‘Tall’ While Wearing Sneakers As A Petite Woman

On the legacy she wants to leave in the sneaker community:

“Life is a sport and play it to win. Whether you’re on the track or you’re playing a game, any game you play, when you think about what you have to put into it, in order for it to have a winning result, it’s athletic. It takes physical, emotional, and mental tenacity – the same as any athlete would have to put into being at the top of their game. From the time we land our feet from the bed onto the ground, we know that we have to warm up. We have to stretch. We have to prepare. We have to garb ourselves to go out to battle or to play the game. When you think about this phase, what it takes to prepare for any sport, it’s the same setup that life is putting in front of us. The warmup, the game time, how you recover after, whether you won this particular one and how you resiliently bounce back. Just because you lose one game, doesn’t mean that you won’t return to fight it to play another.”