These Pre-Ripped New Balance Dad Shoes Look Sharp In Chrome Armor
New Balance is closing out its 25th anniversary with UK sneaker stalwarts size? in style by re-releasing the New Balance 2002r “Protection Pack” shoes and dropping the 3rd and last colorway in sharp silver.
After offering two colorways in previous weeks, one in earthy brown, and on in black and charcoal grey, size? has given its final New Balance “Protection Pack” sneaker drop a kind of slick urban polish that feels more Blade Runner than disco ball.
Gone are the fuzzy suede panels we’ve come to associate with the silhouette. In their place, raw-edged silver leather overlays that feel deliberate, refined, and just a little bit brutalist. They wrap around a breathable mesh upper like chrome armor.
When New Balance designer Yue Wu first created the New Balance 2002r “Refined Future” pack back in 2021, no one, including Wu himself, knew these shoes would become a cultural landmark. Dubbed the “Protection Pack” by the internet hivemind, the jagged, post-apocalyptic take on NB’s 2002r sneaker basically rewrote the rules of what a “dad shoe” could be by making the shoe look more like it’d already been worn down.
This isn’t the first that size? has collaborated with New Balance, but it might be its most balanced effort to date.
Where past versions of the New Balance "Protection Pack" shoes leaned hard into distressed, jagged chaos with exaggerated suede and heavy layering, this collaborative sneaker tones things down with clean lines and raw-edged leather that still nods to the original concept without overwhelming it.
This 2002R drops May 29 exclusively via the size? website, and if the first two colorways are any indication, this one won’t sit around either.
The "Protection Pack" may have started as a one-off concept, but with this final drop, size? and New Balance have cemented it as a modern classic.
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