Awesome But Forgotten And1 Tai Chi Colorways

There’s a version of sneaker history where the AND1 Tai Chi is remembered as one of the most important basketball shoes ever made. And then there’s the version most people know, where it’s the shoe Vince Carter wore at the dunk contest and not much else.

Both versions are true. But the real story is a lot bigger than a single February night in Oakland.

Let me back up.

If you grew up in the 90s, AND1 wasn’t a shoe brand first. It was a feeling. Those trash-talking t-shirts in the back pages of Slam magazine were everywhere… “Do you have a lighter? You’re about to get smoked.” The faceless characters, the irreverent attitude, the way they captured exactly what basketball felt like on a playground, not in a corporate boardroom. AND1 launched in 1993 as essentially an apparel and attitude brand. The idea that they would eventually make sneakers, and that those sneakers would compete with Nike and adidas in the NBA, felt completely far-fetched at the time.

And then they did exactly that.

By the late 90s, AND1 had figured out something that the bigger brands hadn’t quite locked in yet… that streetball culture and NBA culture weren’t as separate as everyone assumed. The AND1 Mixtape era was just getting started, Rafer “Skip to My Lou” Alston was becoming a legend on the blacktop, and the brand was quietly signing NBA players and getting their shoes on the floor in real games. Stephon Marbury was on roster. Kevin Garnett was on roster. Latrell Sprewell, one of the most electric players in the league at the time, was repping the brand on the biggest stages in basketball.

To me, that signals something a lot of people forget about AND1… they were actually competing. Not just existing in Nike’s shadow, but genuinely threading the needle between street credibility and professional performance in a way that felt organic rather than forced.

The Tai Chi dropped in 1999 for $75 retail. Think about that number for a second in context. Foamposites were already in the market. Air Jordans were climbing toward $100 and beyond. The basketball shoe market was getting expensive fast, and AND1 came in with a lightweight, clean, versatile silhouette at a price point that actually made sense for most people. Leather and nubuck upper, breathable mesh on the tongue, a midfoot shank for stability, EVA cushioning… it wasn’t the most technologically complex shoe on the market, but it played well and looked good in almost every colorway they tried. And they tried a lot of them. Over a hundred colorways before it was all said and done, which tells you everything about how well the design translated across colors.

The shoe was particularly popular with guards. Fast, shifty players who needed feel over bulk. And that detail matters when you think about who ended up wearing it the most.

Then February 12th, 2000 happened.

Vince Carter walked into the Slam Dunk Contest in Oakland wearing the AND1 Tai Chi, specifically the red and white colorway, and proceeded to put on the greatest individual performance in dunk contest history. The 360 windmill. The elbow-in-the-rim dunk. The between-the-legs from a bounce pass off the floor. Every dunk felt like it was redefining what was physically possible. And every dunk happened in the Tai Chi.

The wild part? Carter wasn’t even an AND1 athlete. He was still technically under contract with Puma at the time, refusing to wear them due to comfort issues, and his agent was working to get him out of that deal. So he was rotating between brands that season, picking up whatever felt right. On that particular night, what felt right was the Tai Chi.

AND1 couldn’t have scripted it better if they tried. The most watched moment in dunk contest history, broadcast to millions of people, and their shoe is right there, front and center, on the feet of the guy doing things nobody had ever seen before. I think this proves that sometimes the best marketing isn’t marketing at all. It’s just putting a good product into the world and letting the right moment find it.

But here’s what the story usually skips over… just fifteen days later, Carter did it again.

NBC had rearranged its Sunday broadcast schedule specifically to put the Raptors on national TV for the first time, riding the wave of Vinsanity. Carter responded by dropping a career-high 51 points against the Phoenix Suns in a 103-102 win, going 13-for-13 from the free throw line, hitting all four of his three-point attempts, and becoming the first Raptor ever to reach the 50-point mark. He did all of it in the AND1 Tai Chi.

Two legendary performances. Two weeks apart. Same shoe.

After Carter eventually signed with Nike, AND1 kept building. The Tai Chi became the foundation for a brand run that saw them briefly positioned as the second biggest footwear brand in the NBA. When cameras panned to the bench during games in the early 2000s, it wasn’t unusual to see three or four players in AND1s. Latrell Sprewell had his own signature line eventually. Chauncey Billups won Finals MVP in AND1s in 2004 when the Pistons knocked off the Lakers. Ben Wallace, one of the most iconic defensive players of his generation, was in AND1 for his best years. The Tai Chi was the shoe that opened that entire door.

The Tai Chi is also one of only two AND1 silhouettes to ever sell over a million units, which for a brand competing against Nike and adidas is a remarkable achievement for a shoe that most sneakerheads today treat as a footnote rather than a landmark.

To me, that’s the injustice of the story. The AND1 Tai Chi gets referenced every time someone talks about the 2000 dunk contest, but it rarely gets its own moment. It deserves one. Because the shoe itself, independent of Vince Carter, independent of any single performance, was genuinely good… affordable, versatile, well-designed, and worn by some of the most compelling players of a genuinely great era of basketball.

The colorways alone are worth exploring. From the classic black and white yin-yang split that defined the silhouette, to the Latrell Sprewell PEs, to the St. Patrick’s Day editions, to the player exclusives that most people have never seen in person… the Tai Chi had range that very few shoes of its era could match.

And in an era where Y2K everything is having its moment, the Tai Chi feels more relevant than it has in years. Clean lines, versatile colorways, a design that doesn’t try too hard. That’s exactly what sneaker culture is gravitating toward right now.

The Tai Chi was never just a dunk contest shoe. It was the shoe that helped prove AND1 belonged in the same conversation as the biggest brands in the game… and for a few years, at least, it absolutely did.

Check out some of the crazy and forgotten colorways that were created through the years below.

Of course, the modern-day internet folklore has come to focus on the And 1 Tai Chi and the 2000 NBA Slam Dunk Contest. Vince Carter, Toronto Raptors star and at the time, one of the most exciting players in the game laced up a red and white pair, which solidified the And1 Tai Chi as one of the most storied sneakers of the modern era. In 1999 when the And1 Tai Chi originally released, retail was $75. Thinking back about other shoes in the era, Foamposites, Jordans, etc., the price point and lightweight design made the shoes one of the most competitive shoes on the market. Add to that a color scheme that seems to look good in nearly every color combination, it’s no wonder the Tai Chi is making a come back in 2015.