Nigel Sylvester hits home with ‘Driveway’ Air Jordan 4 collaboration

In the past decade, BMX athlete Nigel Sylvester has ridden bicycles worldwide while building his transcendent brand as a content creator, fashion influencer and social philanthropist.

Yet, Sylvester hasn’t forgotten the genesis of his career, which began in the Laurelton neighborhood of Jamaica, Queens, New York — specifically in the driveway of his grandmother’s house, where he first learned to ride a bike.

Sylvester’s unique athletic origins come to life on his latest sneaker design for the Jordan Brand: the “Driveway Grey” Air Jordan 4 RM, which hit retail Thursday at $160 a pair. On July 20, Sylvester’s Jordan 4 collaboration debuted in a limited “Fence Green” colorway, also inspired by his grandmother’s house. Creatively steered by Sylvester, his passion project has been in the works for over a year after the Jordan Brand chose the BMX pro to headline the new RM model — short for RestoMod, a combination of restoration modification — of the iconic Air Jordan 4 silhouette.

“The days in my grandmother’s driveway were the best,” Sylvester told Andscape in a late 2022 interview. “Those were the days where my curiosity was peaking and I wanted to express myself on a bicycle. Whether it was on my big wheel, or as I got a little bit older, a little 16-inch. Then from there, it just continued to evolve. It went from a hobby to a love to an obsession. Every hour I had, every free moment I had, I was riding my bicycle.”

Sylvester’s rendition of the Air Jordan 4 notably swaps out the original 1989 “Nike Air” typography on the heels of each shoe to officially introduce his own signature “Bike Air” branding. The phrase and concept originated around 2021, when Sylvester left his longtime partnership with Nike’s SB division to join the Jordan Brand, sparked by the heads he turned in sneaker culture with his debut Air Jordan collaboration in 2018. Officially signing as the Jordan Brand’s first and only BMX endorser became a milestone for Sylvester, a Caribbean American who is the son of immigrants from Grenada. He still vividly remembers receiving his first bike.

“My dad got me a 1998 or ’99 Mongoose Sniper,” Sylvester told Andscape. “It was all-black. It had chrome handle bars, chrome forks, alloy wheels, red and yellow stickers.”

Along with the rollout of the “Driveway” 4s, Sylvester teamed up with his sponsor, Specialized Bicycle Components, to unveil the first Air Jordan-branded BMX bike, limited to a production of only 17 models, inspired by his childhood wheels. Sylvester wrote and starred in a commercial for the shoe, which was filmed at the house where his grandmother lived. The 90-second spot, featuring former Family Matters actor Jo Marie Payton as Sylvester’s grandmother, has since appeared both in Times Square and at Citi Field.

“My first legit BMX bike meant everything to me, man,” Sylvester told Andscape. “I took the brakes off and pulled up on my homies at the park and was like, ‘Yo, look at my new bike.’ It was one of those feelings that I’ll never forget. I feel like it was my entrance into BMX, properly.”

Sylvester made the most of his debut BMX bike, using those two wheels to roam through New York City and develop his keen eye for fashion and footwear, which ultimately landed him professional endorsements and collaborations with high-profile brands such as Kith, New Era, Oakley, Fendi, Louis Vuitton, Moncler, Nike and Jordan.

“Growing up in Jamaica, Queens, I would go out and ride and roll through different neighborhoods and see all these different influences of how people wore their sneakers,” Sylvester told Andscape. “How people dress uptown versus in Brooklyn versus in Queens versus on the Lower East Side. Getting to see all these different things, I would naturally take something from here and flip it. Take something from over here and flip it. And that just continued to evolve throughout my life and career. Now, I’ve gotten to this spot where I know what works for me.”

Around the time he turned pro in BMX at 18, Sylvester signed his first footwear endorsement deal with Nike in 2005. Yet it wasn’t until another decade later that Sylvester received his first opportunity to design a sneaker. In March 2014, Sylvester and the Swoosh released the “S.O.M.P.” (“Standing On My Pedals”) Nike SB Dunk High. Original pairs of the shoe now list for up to $3,500 on sneaker resale platforms. By 2015, Sylvester attracted global attention by launching his digital lifestyle and travel film series, GO. Co-directed by the BMX athlete and director/photographer Harrison Boyce, the GO series amassed over 100 million views in five years, setting the stage and market for expanding Sylvester’s endorsement profile.

“I can’t remember the very first time I ever saw Nigel, but I remember he got this Nike Sportswear campaign and the brand put billboards of him up in New York City,” Boyce told Andscape. “I know that was a big moment in Nigel’s career, but it was also a very big moment for BMX. Only skateboarders had previously gotten that type of publicity before. So, I was happy that a big brand like Nike would highlight a BMX athlete like Nigel in that capacity. Nike positioned him just as a person. That was the first moment I felt Nigel is different.”

Different is probably the most fitting way to describe Sylvester’s debut collaboration with the Jordan Brand, which arrived in August 2018 on the OG Air Jordan 1 High silhouette. 

“To have the opportunity to collaborate on a Jordan 1, which is my favorite silhouette, and tell the story of how my shoes distress when I’m out riding my bike was a game changer,” Sylvester told Andscape. “It was a moment, for sure. I was so happy.”

For their first shoe together, Sylvester and the Jordan Brand took on the ambitious challenge of re-creating, and ultimately mass producing, a pair that looked and felt like some of the Air Jordans he’s essentially destroyed on a bike throughout his travels across the world. Sylvester provided Jordan with personal sneakers, highlighted by an old pair of Shadow 1s, and images illustrating how worn down his kicks can get. And with that inspiration, the brand’s design team started cooking.

“It was just about being authentically me,” Sylvester told Andscape. “Like, I’m gonna put my Jordans on, I’m gonna ride in them and they’re naturally gonna get beat up because of what I do. My bike has no brakes on it. So when I need to stop, it’s my foot on the ground or my foot goes into the tire. So, the shoe gets beat up naturally. Being able to take that story and share it with brand and world, I was just honored and grateful for that first opportunity.”

To this day, the BMX pro still remembers the moment then-Jordan footwear designer Frank Cooke showed him the final sample of the “Nigel Sylvester” Air Jordan 1s for the first time.

“We were actually editing GO and Frank Cooke FaceTimed me like, ‘Yo, it’s here. It’s done,’” Sylvester recalled. “I was like, ‘Send me the shoe right now. Take it to FedEx and overnight it to me, ASAP!’ I got it a couple days later and was blown away. It looked so beautiful, bro. I couldn’t believe it. Honestly, my Air Jordan 1 collaboration was life-changing.”

More than five years after his debut Air Jordan release, Sylvester returns with back-to-back designs on the Air Jordan 4, telling a story of home and the elders who made the life-changing moment of receiving his first BMX bike possible.

“When I think about my family and parents leaving Grenada and how courageous they were to come to New York to pursue an opportunity, it means everything to me,” Sylvester told Andscape. “I’m proud of them, because I understand the sacrifice of leaving your home and comfort zone to go on a completely new journey. I channel that energy. I have my entire career. Because, for me, it’s always been this attitude of I will not lose. Like, I have to accomplish whatever it is I put my mind to because of the people that sacrificed so much for me to get here.”

Sylvester has yet to miss on an Air Jordan design. And it doesn’t sound like his relentless ride in sneakers will be stopped anytime soon.

“I would love to touch the Jordan 3 at some point,” Sylvester told Andscape. “Maybe that’ll happen one day.”