The swelling trend towards visibility in cycling apparel has brought for two new pairs of shoes from Giro: the Empire ACC Reflective and the $190 Republic LX Reflective.
Apparel companies are increasingly adding safety elements with bright fluorescents and/or reflective tabs, strips or special materials. Sugoi brought some real visual pop to riding in the dark not too long ago with the Zap jacket that’s made with Pixel, a reflective, waterproof material.
The Giro Empire ACC Reflective shoe is the same design as the original Empire that has sparked a revival of lace-up cycling shoes. Seemingly every shoe company at Eurobike 2015 has at least one lace-up model on show. Two years ago you likely would have only seen the Empire with laces.
The Giro Empire ACC Reflective uses a reflective coating in the microfiber exterior, which appears gray in the sunlight but bright white under the headlamps of vehicles.
The shoe weighs a claimed 215g in size 42.5.
The $190 Republic shoe LX design (regional pricing is TBC) was originally released as part of Giro’s New Road clothing collection, which has just morphed into a line called Venture. Now it comes in Reflective as well.
In related news, Giro has a new $85 helmets with MIPS called the Foray that shares some styling cues with the Synthe, but at a substantially more approachable price.
Check out more news from Eurobike at our Eurobike homepage.
