adidas today rolls out the latest “iteration of its Derrick Rose signature shoe as well as the first clothing in a Derrick Rose apparel line,” according to Allan Brettman of the Portland OREGONIAN. adidas and Rose have been “undeterred in forging ahead with an ambitious marketing and product development plan.” adidas America Creative Dir Rob Lee said, “We meet with him five to 10 times a year depending on the projects we’re working on and his availability.” He added, "We work pretty regularly with his family and with him to get their input from a design perspective." Lee: "Every time we do a new shoe we want to improve from the last one. We need to meet with him and see what's working and what's not.” Brettman noted adidas created “a graphic that depicts Rose’s life in the form of a tree” that can be found on T-shirt and the “tongue of a shoe.” Lee: “We wanted to tell this family tree story of Derrick's life and incorporate where he was at that moment in time and all of his accomplishments but create something personal, too.” Lee said Rose wants the shoe to be worn "on and off court," and for kids "to able to wear it.” Lee said, "When you create a logo for Derrick Rose you may say, 'Eh, let's just make a rose. That's a pretty simple thing to do.' But we wanted to make sure we encapsulated his life within this logo. So each petal represents one of his brothers. ... And then we wanted the petals of the rose not to be soft but to be sharp and be aggressive -- like his style of play.” Lee added, "We also worked on creating this D in there. That's obviously for 'D Rose.' And the centerpoint was a 'one' (Rose's uniform number) but it also represented his mother, Brenda. That's Derrick's starting point, that's his foundation” (OREGONLIVE.com, 10/3).
