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There are collabs, and then there are collabs that make you feel something. The Earls Collection x ASICS GEL-CUMULUS 16 and Lethal Testimonial 4 IT are the latter; shoes built less around aesthetics and more around a man finding his way back to where it all started.
EARLS founder Lewi Brown, who grew up in Belfast, Christchurch, New Zealand, traded the rugby pitch for fashion and built one of Australia’s most respected labels. With this second ASICS partnership, he’s going back home.
For those who caught the first chapter, the EARLS x ASICS GT-2160 “Ngāwari” from 2024, that drop laid the foundation, weaving sport, culture, and personal story into a single silhouette. The GEL-CUMULUS 16 picks up right where it left off, continuing a personal expression of Brown’s values and Māori culture, centered on home and healing.
The ASICS GEL-CUMULUS 16 starts with a cream knit upper layered with rich brown suede overlays, a palette pulled directly from the textures of the house Brown grew up in. His grandmother’s knitting, the front lawn where a love for rugby first took root, and the people who shaped him before he even knew what he was becoming — it’s all in here. The most intimate detail lives on the insoles, where a print replicates the actual carpet from inside his childhood home. The campaign imagery for the sneakers was even shot at the same location where the only existing photo of Brown and his father was taken.
And it turns out, the ASICS GEL-CUMULUS 16 isn’t the only thing EARLS and ASICS have been working on. Brown has also revealed the EARLS x ASICS Lethal Testimonial 4 IT, a football boot that pulls from an entirely different corner of his story—Crosbie Park on a Christchurch morning, tiny borrowed black boots, a grandfather’s belief, and a kid dreaming of the white boots he saw on TV but couldn’t yet reach. The Lethal Testimonial 4 IT is designed through the lens of that boy and for every player who ever treated their boots like armor.
The EARLS x ASICS GEL-CUMULUS 16 launches globally on May 21st via ASICS.com (11am ET) and select retailers. EQL raffles for both the GEL-CUMULUS 16 and Lethal Testimonial 4 IT are now open on the Earls Collection website and close on May 14th at 8pm ET.
EARLS x ASICS GEL-CUMULUS 16 “Home”
Color: Coconut Milk/Black
Style Code: 1203B053-200
Release Date: May 21, 2026
Price: $180 USD
EARLS x ASICS Lethal Testimonial 4 IT “Home”
Release Date: May 23, 2026
Price: $320 AUD
