Sneakers are our go-to comfort shoes, which provide us the swag and comfort we need. With the buzz of sneakers in the market, various designs have come up, and it’s always a race for the brands. With sneakers getting mainstream, customers are always searching for something unique. It may be their personal touch or something artistic. It can be anything actually. What matters is that the customer should be enticed with the sneaker. For this, sneaker customisers have put a foot down and grabbed this opportunity with enthusiastic passion. These customisers apply their skill and love for design, art, pattern, etc., and pour their talent into customising the sneakers. You may not know, but the Indian industry is filled with such talented people. 

Here are 10 Indian sneaker customisers that you need to follow on Instagram:

1. Chaitanya Dixit

Chaitanya Dixit popularly known as Che is the top choice among the sneaker customisers in India. He tags himself as an artist who’s also a sneakerhead. As the game changer of the sneaker scene, his passion for art and design speaks for itself. Among the brands, he has worked with G-Shock, Homegrown Street, Reebok, Fila, Adidas, VegNonVeg, Superkicks, Puma, and so on. Also, he has customised sneakers for celebs and stars like Divine, Ranbir Kapoor, Raja Kumari, Wiz Khalifa, Like Mike, Dimitri Vegas, Alia Bhatt, Harsh Varrdhan Kapoor, Sangeet Paryani, and Anand Ahuja. With Che Labs, he’s making it big in the industry. On Instagram, he has 24.9K followers.

Let’s get a peek into his life!

2. Saigun Grover

The man behind Courtside, Saigun Grover has 421 followers on Instagram and prefers his private life. With over 8K followers on Instagram, Courtside’s designs are based on Gen-Z preferences. From ‘Among Us’ imposters, floral patterns, cartoons, animal print, and more. Based in New Delhi, they “paint, embroider, de-construct & stitch up authentic sneakers to make something bold and different”, as stated by Courtside on their website. Click here to visit!

Here’s Saigun’s story with Suhana Sethi, the shoe content creator:   

3. Rahul Dev

Rahul Dev brings us crazy and lifelike customs with his whole passion. He literally considers the sneakers as his canvas. If you want designs based on anime or movie characters, Rahul’s brand Unhinged Customs is the first choice! The brand has such high demand that the June slots for orders are already closed. Don’t believe me? Then, check out the page’s bio which has got 12.9K followers! It also has a YouTube channel of 280 subscribers, where some of the BTS videos have been uploaded. Daniel Fernandes and Soha Ali Khan have tried out his hand-painted shoes. From making Naruto, Venom, SpongeBob, Itachi Uchiha, animal faces, etc. he has dabbled in so many varieties!

4. Santanu Hazarika

Winner of RedBull World Doodle Art Champion 2014, Santanu Hazarika is a quirky and aesthetic art fanatic. His customs and artworks are based on doodles and illustrations. Recently, his first NFT’s are hot selling all over! He has worked with brands like Adidas and Reebok. He has got a follower base of 40.2K on Instagram and 837 subscribers on YouTube.

Santanu conducted a doodling workshop with Adidas:

5. Nishant Fogaat

Considering himself to be an accidental designer and a creative entrepreneur, Osaka and New Delhi-based Nishant Fogaat is the founder of FOGI (Full of Great Ideas). He has done quite creative and exclusive projects like upcycling shoes, and it’s said that he’s the first-ever creator to reconstruct sneakers into caps by upcycling, terming the product as “sneaker snapbacks”. This got him the opportunity to work with Nike India in their first Kicks Lounge. Apart from Nike, the NIFT graduate has worked with brands like Puma, Myntra, Levis, Absolut, JD Sports, Mimaki, Kickstarter, VegNonVeg, Jameson, Anand Ahuja’s bhaane and more. Nishant’s customs are colourful and sometimes sparkly too. He has over 4K followers on Instagram.

Check out his sneaker snapback:

6. Vaishak Seraphim

Vaishak Seraphim is an artist. Apart from customising sneakers, he makes custom clocks, clothing, guitars, paintings, graphic art, and one-off decor pieces. He has over 2K followers on Instagram and has worked with Superkicks and Puma. From his Puma opportunity, his customs caught the attention of Virat Kohli, Dabboo Ratnani, and Ahaan Panday.

7. Mana Santhanam

Mana Santhanam is the founder of Mana Custom Art and has over 5K followers on Instagram. Apart from customising shoes, she’s a singer too and has appeared on MTV Unplugged during Guru Randhawa’s performance. Her designs consist of famous paintings like Van Gogh’s ‘The Starry Night’, movie characters like Batman, Joker, Harry Potter, anime, and so on. For the famous rapper Raftaar, she had customised ‘Dragonball Z’ themed shoes. 

8. Guneev Chadha

Delhi-based fashion designer, Guneev Chadha is known for his cool designs. He doesn’t only use paint for customisation, but also tries out miscellaneous ways like using a zipper to make a funky pair of sneakers. He has over 1K followers on Instagram.

9. Nazarul Haque

Founder of Naz Shoes Customiser, Nazurul Haque is from Shillong. His brand’s tagline is “Let your Kicks be UNIQUE”, and the page has over 3K followers on Instagram. Nazrul’s personal account itself has 641 followers. His customs are pretty creative and he knows the way to work with glitches and neon colours. You will notice all the pop-culture designs are added to his customs. Raftaar and Rannvijay Singha were among his clients. 

10. Srish S. Gopal

Srish S. Gopal owns a queer-identified business, Blank Canvas. Their brand focuses on shoe and t-shirt customisation. Their collections are inspired by Van Gogh and LGBT community. The brand has 538 followers on Instagram, while personally, they has around 379 followers.

So, these were some of the amazing Indian sneaker customisers whose designs must have blown away your mind by now. No kidding! They deserve more support and encouragement for their growth, and why not? They are amazing and some of them have even worked for celebrities! Let’s help them shine more and inspire aspiring customisers to bloom.