William G. Hildebrand ³ (b. 1994 in Arles, France) is a color and material footwear designer at Nike. In 2018, William starts a trend strategist position for Fashion Snoops—a NYC based trend forecasting agency—where he led projects for heavy hitting brands such as Timberland, Vans, Woolrich, and Foot locker. Through this role, he develops a fascination for crafting narratives which connect the dots between culture, consumer and product. In 2021, he relocates to Rotterdam where he starts his footwear design journey at Mizuno as a color designer. In this position, William collaborated with the global footwear team to establish seasonal color strategies for performance and sportstyle categories through market research, trend analysis, and concept development. Additionally, he was responsible for creating 2D and 3D color CADs within various footwear categories including running, handball, and volleyball. Fast forward to June 2022, William lands a footwear design role at Nike EMEA Geo Express Lane—a dream position where he can apply his experience in trend forecasting and pursue his passion for storytelling, color, and materials.
Footwear Color & Material Design
Mizuno Wave Stealth Neo “Kintsugi”
Creation of a seasonal pack for SS23 including color & graphic. The pack was inspired by Kintsugi (金継ぎ, "golden joinery")—the Japanese art of repairing broken pottery by mending the areas of breakage with gold lacquer. As a philosophy, it treats breakage and repair as part of the history of an object, rather than something to disguise.
